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The epitome of everything that's good about '90s hip-hop (the record is 'set' in 1994) by the archetypal '90s hip-hop group, There Is Only Now is genuinely the finest moment of a band who haven't put a foot wrong in two decades. It should be out by the time you read this, on producer <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/adrian-younge.html" target="_blank">Adrian Younge</a>'s Linear Labs label. We spoke to Tajai of the mighty Souls of Mischief crew...</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cvpYGNAJe20/VBB0isRg13I/AAAAAAAAAe8/_9jv3CBLnk8/s1600/Souls%2Bchilling%2B1b.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cvpYGNAJe20/VBB0isRg13I/AAAAAAAAAe8/_9jv3CBLnk8/s1600/Souls%2Bchilling%2B1b.jpg" height="400" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Souls of Mischief, chillin' in the cooler. By <a href="http://littleliedown.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Andy Smoke</a>.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">&nbsp;</span><b><b><br /></b></b></div><b><b>Your producer, Adrian Younge, told me that this album was basically a follow-up to 93 'til Infinity. Is that right?</b></b><br />Maybe Adrian thinks of it as the follow-up to the first album, because it's set in 1994, but that's basically a completely made up concept based around things that were happening in '94. We don't look at it as our second album! We have a large catalogue. Maybe if you put yourself into the mindset, into the context of that era, then maybe it could be seen as our second album. But we didn't try to go back or recreate anything, you know? It's just that the timeline is set in 1994.<b><br /><b><br /></b><b>You guys had a pretty big 1994, following the success of your first record. Are you touching upon any of that?</b></b><br />Not at all. The musical style, and the actual album, are set at that time. The year 1994 is not significant at all.<b><br /><b><br /></b></b><br /><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/4jLqfrBrDTw?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Can you tell me more about the concept of There Is Only Now? I think it's your best album.</b><br />It's basically is a wild tale which grew out of a real experience in 1994 where someone tried to kill us after the club. I think it is our best record too but I think that about every record we record. I think that it is <i>insane</i> for artists not to feel that their most current effort is their best. Like, what are you recording for if you aren't trying to top the previous catalogue? But it is a wild ride, very story-heavy and the beats, because they are all original, analogue recordings and overseen by a maestro like Adrian, definitely stand way out. I will not be surprised when people deem it our best record thus far.</div><div><br /></div><b>What was it like working with Adrian, compared to working with Prince Paul?</b><br /><div><div><div><div><div><div><div>Adrian is a completely live, completely analogue producer. With Prince Paul we'd pick fifteen, maybe twenty, beats out of about two hundred that we'd listened to, and then started crafting the album piece by piece in that manner. With Adrian, his music is all from scratch. Every day he would make new music, and we just started recording, step by step. We weren't going back and forth between different beats or anything like that. Every day he would create something new, and we'd listen to it, and figure out what it was going to be in the story, then record that record. Then he'd go and make another song after that. He didn't just have a bunch of beats sitting around. It was crafted.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="https://ytimg.googleusercontent.com/vi/KhjI6ZQ_TEk/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/KhjI6ZQ_TEk&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/KhjI6ZQ_TEk&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b>It must have been pretty cool inviting somebody like that into your group. Was it a fun record to make?</b></div><div>Yeah. It was a completely new experience. It was super exciting. You can hear in the record, the difference in how it was made. Everything has its place, nothing comes from left-field, and every song is different. It wasn't like we chose a particular style. He made music based on the emotion, on the feel of the day. Completely different from anything we had done before.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Sounds like it might have taken a while to do.</b></div><div>You know what, it took basically a day for each song. We recorded over about a two month period, but there's, what, seventeen songs? So seventeen of those days was recording and the rest was just refining. The process didn't necessarily take longer than if we had picked a bunch of beats. In fact it went quicker, because we only focused on the task at hand each time. There was no jumping around. Every day was tailor made for the music of that day.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Whose idea was it to get Busta and Snoop on the record? Did you write with those dudes?</b></div><div>We all - Souls and Adrian - sat and thought of who would be best for the roles and they - Busta and Snoop - were shoe-ins for their parts. Now that they have recorded the stuff, I can't imagine any artists in all of hip-hop who could be more fitting. We are all super grateful that they added on to the project, it was magical.</div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZeZDA4qksgU?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Were you aware at the time of how much Hieroglyphics music, how much Souls of Mischief music, was in skateboard videos in around '93, '94, '95..? For a lot of people like me back then, skateboard videos were the best way to hear good new hip-hop.</b></div><div>We just had friends that were skaters who chose the music on the parts. We didn't realise that those friends were, like, Mike Carroll, you know?! We didn't realise the level, or that they were creating something new and completely different, that was kind of complimented by our music. We were just like "Hey, you like the music? Go ahead, skate to it!" The songs on those old videos were like demo songs! That was before the record came out; they were songs that were on cassette demo. We didn't have any idea that some of that stuff would be so big, or mean so much so many years later.</div><div><br /><b>There have been Souls of Mischief solo albums - was there ever any question of the band splitting up to go solo?</b></div><div>Oh, no. We have the creative freedom to do whatever we want to do<b>, </b>and as you grow musically, some of that stuff you want to do on your own, but it's never been like that. We're the only rap group left, right? The industry went towards solo artists, and the groups are 'super groups' made up of solo artists. We're the only group left. Us and De La Soul. We understand the power in numbers, and longevity, and we have the creative space - because we're independent - to put out records that are individual records, but we've never even had a falling out, you know? We've always just been a group. Look at the longevity we've had. That's got a lot to do with the fact that there's four people steering the ship and not just one. We can build up each others' strengths and weaknesses so we can continue to elevate. It's never been at the point where we've thought there's going to be a break up, or a change in personnel or anything. The craziest thing we've done is bring in outside producers, because everybody in the group produces too. Except for me. So it's us and De La. If you wanna call Public Enemy a group, then yeah, but as far as an active recording group there's literally us and De La. You never hear about a break up, or De La having problems or anything, even if they do in real life. That's who we modeled our success after. Those guys. They just stay consistent. We're the only real competition, and the way I see it is that we're competing against each other. We aren't competing against Wu-Tang, or any of these other collectives. I mean, are there any other collectives? We keep each other sharp. Sometimes it's easier to travel, as one person, rather than four. That's the only disadvantage of being a group. Some promoters won't bring out five people - they'll bring out one because they can't afford it.<br /><b><br /></b></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZpI9BQwOvoo?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Do you think the rise of the solo hip-hop superstar, and the deification of Kanye, is ruining things?</b></div><div>I don't think it's ruining the music. I think, more so than that, the artists all want the hot producer to make their music, right? So we go through periods in hip-hop where all the music sounds the same. You look at the Gang Starr Foundation, where Premier was the basis of all their beats between Jeru, Group Home, Big Shug, all those dudes - they had a sound. Or Juice Crew - Marley Marl was producing all their stuff, so they had a sound, right? The thing with solo artists, and with pushing these individual personalities rather than musical movements is that individual artists want whoever's hot. So we go through these epochs where every single song that's big is produced by Timbaland. Where every single song that's big is produced by Neptunes. Where every single song that's big is produced by J.U.S.T.I.C.E. League. So all the music sounds the same. As far as at the mainstream, popular level. As a genre we don't have very much to stand on when all the music sounds the same and it's the same beat over and over again, because they're promoting superstar producers. It makes it so that people don't really develop their sounds, as far as the sonics, the music, because all they're doing is working on their lyrics and trying to find the biggest producer. I've never hated the radio as much as I hate it right now. It's the absolute bottom of the barrel, it's the worst music. From all genres. A lot of these artists have great albums, but you listen to the single and it's the <i>same song</i> over and over and over again. Everybody's rapping like Two Chains. I liked grime, but you listen to grime rappers now and they sound like shitty American rappers. It's frustrating because that doesn't push the music or the culture forward at all.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>It's damaging that some kid could put on a hip-hop channel now and just hear garbage.</b></div><div>And it's nothing to do with hip-hop, there's a lot of great music out there. The way the labels are structured, the way the radio's structured, they just play the same stuff. Because hip-hop is no longer an underground thing, it's just for pop fans. It's no different from David Guetta or Pink, you know? I get it, I mean, it makes money, but it's very different from growing up where you would go to the club to hear new songs. Now you go to the club to hear the same song you heard on the radio all day long.<br /><b><br /></b></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/CouVxNHikyk?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>There was meant to be a Souls of Mischief/Pharcyde collaboration album. What happened with that?</b></div><div>I don't know, it just never came to fruition regarding the business side of it. It was like 1998, so that's sixteen years old now. Although it'd probably do good because it was so ahead of its time. But then, right now everything's so regressive because it's so mainstream. It's vapid. The things that people think are lyrical, are elementary rap flows from twenty-plus years ago. People are like "Oh, he's so lyrical, he said this" or whatever, but I'm like "Actually, L.L. already said that twenty years ago". There's no history there now, and because of that people think the stuff they hear is the best thing since sliced bread. And it's actually a rehashed old song. It was different with sampling, because you were<i> looking</i> for old stuff. Now, guys may have heard something somewhere, and they try to use it in their music and pass it off as their own. Instead of paying homage to where it came from. Because they don't even know where it came from, they're not doing their history. We were doing history, we were learning about James Brown at the same time as we were sampling. Or learning about Earth, Wind &amp; Fire, or learning about Roy Ayers, or learning about Bob James. Instead of just like "Let's take this whole song and rehash it because we can make a lot of money". Nobody was making any money.<br /><b><br /></b></div><div><b>Talking of history, what kind of crowd came out when you toured that first album? Was it people who'd been there at the time?</b><br />We did the whole album, plus 'Cabfare' - a demo classic. It was awesome to see multiple generations rock out to our old record and know all the words. I think we did a couple new songs as well, but it was a crazy experience doing the entire album all over for the 20th anniversary. You don't realise how many people you have touched until you do something like that. That record represents a whole era, you know?<br /><b><br /></b></div><div><b>I really do. What's your plan for when the album comes out?</b><br />Hopefully we'll go out with Venice Dawn - the band that plays the music - and with Adrian. And I'm hoping we'll maybe go out with Ghostface, or Bilal, or Common maybe. Just touring; the US and an international tour. Get back in the lab and record some more. We'll be taking a big production of tour, with lights and costumes and things of that nature. Adrian does these things all the way.<b></b><br /><b><br /></b></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/NcdHoFwA5LA?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>I saw Ghostface last night, and there was no show whatsoever. He brought his son out for a few bars, but that was it. It was pretty disappointing. Do you think artists are forgetting their role as entertainers? Something like Wu is a product anyway, and they'll always sell tickets - do you think even the people who are great artists, great writers and are great rappers are neglecting their 'duty'?</b><br />Ghostface with Venice Dawn is an entirely different experience. There is storytelling, opera, costumes etc. One thing about Adrian is that he has a flair for theatrics, both musically and live, so anything he touches is kicked up a notch. However, I believe many rappers have fallen so far from MCing, or being Masters of Ceremony, that the live show is not as much of a priority anymore. This is funny because nowadays the show is the <i>only</i> way rappers can get paid, so I hope to see an upswing in showmanship in the coming years.<br /><b><br /></b></div><div><b>OK, one other thing - has anybody ever claimed to be Bridget? Seems like a thing a crazed fan might do.</b></div><div>Haha! Lots of women with that name come to the shows, and the song definitely gets them excited. But no, no Bridget! Haha!</div><div><b>Cool. Thanks a lot man, you guys rule.</b></div><div>Thank <i>you</i>! Peace.</div></div></div></div></div></div></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2014/09/souls-of-mischief.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-2358990288324586806Wed, 10 Sep 2014 16:22:00 +00002014-09-11T02:23:45.221-07:00Adrian Younge<b>Having seemingly appeared from nowhere, and despite his career being in its infancy, LA's Adrian Younge has quickly stamped his indelible mark - and style - on the music industry. The 35 year-old multi-instrumentalist, producer and songwriter had already written and produced a <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/ghostface-killah-and-sheek-louch-wu.html" target="_blank">Ghostface Killah</a> album, produced an album by the classic soul band Delfonics, soundtracked (and edited) the modern blaxploitation masterpiece Black Dynamite and made his own solo album before the call came to produce the forthcoming album by legendary Oakland hip-hop collective <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/souls-of-mischief.html" target="_blank">Souls of Mischief</a>. We're stoked a guy as busy as him found time to sit down and talk to us. </b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-5DILa3XlUB0/VBB6FXbZZCI/AAAAAAAAAfI/-NR7DgyKzP4/s1600/Adrian%2BYounge1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-5DILa3XlUB0/VBB6FXbZZCI/AAAAAAAAAfI/-NR7DgyKzP4/s1600/Adrian%2BYounge1.jpg" height="265" width="400" /></a></div><br /><b>You seem to have come up from nowhere. How did things change from you being an enthusiastic kid to you producing records by artists that I presume are your heroes?</b><br />Yeah. My first release that I guess everybody heard was Black Dynamite. I did a score for this movie called Black Dynamite. A soundtrack. That kind of showed everybody my sound, my kinda seventies sound, and from there I did an album called Something About April, in 2011. A couple of songs on there were sampled by Jay-Z on Magna Carta, and that gave a lot of awareness to what I was doing. As far as playing live instruments to recreate an old sound, to make it modern. If that makes any sense. This Souls of Mischief album is one that's just crazy because as you said, I'm working with my heroes. Working with Ghostface, having Jay-Z sample my stuff, doing a Souls of Mischief album; it's crazy. It's a very humbling experience, and in working with these legendary artists it pushes me to be on top of my game and be the best I can be. I think the Souls of Mischief album is my personal best work.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="https://ytimg.googleusercontent.com/vi/Snq-_eDWDsw/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/Snq-_eDWDsw&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/Snq-_eDWDsw&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b>These artists already each have very established identities, and now you're writing their music and producing them. Is it hard to walk a line between making a record for yourself and a record for them?</b><br />As a producer, you have to meet halfway. You and the artist have to figure out where that line is. There are certain things I won't do. Everything I do is analogue, so if an artist didn't want me to record on tape I wouldn't record with them, regardless of who it is. That's just part of me. So we meet each other in the middle, and I say "What do you want? This is what I can produce for you, this is what I think will work for you, how do you feel about that?" And we'll agree or disagree. We'll get to the position where we can make things work, and make the best music we can. That's been the plan for all the music I've done.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/mZHgvCQU6G8?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>I know you learned to play drums through listening to hip-hop. What's the difference between playing along to sampled, looped drums and playing along to real soul drums?</b> <b>Explain to people.</b></div><div><div><div>Hip-hop culture is based on vinyl culture, and vinyl culture is based on people loving records. Music that was made on records. To me, the golden era for vinyl was '68 to '73, as far as recording is concerned. Hip-hop is based on a lot of the music that was made at that time. A lot of hip-hop producers took the drum break and they made new music out of that. I'd study those drum breaks - I'd study what they did back then - and I try to record in that fashion now. I try to make my drums sound like I got them from an old record. Hip-hop drums, for the most part, are basically funk drums. But then also, there's classic rock grooves that have drum breaks. They can have a funky beat to them too, so you would take it. A hip-hop producer should listen to all drums, whether it's classic rock, country or whatever, to determine if they can find soul in those drums. If they can, they'll create a song around it. That's what I did.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/USd3ay54C3g?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>I read somewhere that you stopped listening to hip-hop in '97. Was that a reflection on your tastes at the time, or a reflection on the way hip-hop started going?</b></div><div>That's a very good question, and there were multiple reasons. First of all, I was getting really into records, and I was getting really into DJing at the time. I was listening to records that were just blowing my mind, and were actually better than the hip-hop getting made at that time. Beastie Boys sampled Superfly, Ice-T sampled Superfly, but when you listen to Curtis Mayfield's Superfly, you realise how good - how much better - that soundtrack is compared to the other versions. No offence to the Beasties or to Ice-T, but that's how good the original music is. The original music to me is better than the hip-hop, so I started studying the original music to try to become even more inspired by what they did, with the source material. Hip-hop was changing a lot at that time, it was getting a lot more mainstream, a lot more pop. Hip-hop wasn't being made as much for the subculture as it was prior. It was made for radio, and television, and it just did not have the same underground vibe to me, so I wanted to get away from that and find music that still catered for the underground vibe, and to me that was all the old records I was finding. That was when I stopped listening to hip-hop.<br /><b><br /></b></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="https://ytimg.googleusercontent.com/vi/_UrgkcPxCh4/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/_UrgkcPxCh4&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/_UrgkcPxCh4&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b>A lot of these 'classic' artists just put out the same album again and again, based on their one banger - their Superfly, or their Paul's Boutique or whatever. Do you think artists have any obligation to evolve?</b></div><div>My thinking is that artists should do what they feel is their best music. Artists should never chase money, artists should never try to be trendy and artists should never try to appeal to younger audiences. Artists should just make what they feel is good. If an artist is making music in the seventies, then thirty years later is still making the same music, then more power to you if that's what you feel is good. I don't like when 'legends' try to adjust to a younger audience to make money. It saddens me when producers, artists and composers do that. We saw a lot of artists do that when disco came. Nobody was doing disco before that time, and when disco came in, soul groups and soul performers weren't making as much money because disco was making all the money, so they just started making disco songs. Singles, or even full albums, when these artists had never recorded disco music prior. Everything, for me, is looking back to move forward. Hip-hop is still great, but I just don't look for it because the records I listen to inspire me more than what's going on today.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>How much input did you have to the Ghostface record? It sounds to me like you pretty much made the whole thing.</b></div><div>He wrote all his vocals, but as far as the music is concerned, I wrote all the music.<br /><b><br /></b></div><div><b>Did he write the vocals...</b></div><div>...after he heard the music. Exactly.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>What did you think of the Apollo Brown remix of that album?</b></div><div>Oh, he did a great job man. I love Apollo Brown. It's funny man, a lot of people compare them, like is mine better or is his better... It's one of these things where I'm just proud of what he did, and I never really tried to figure out which is better, I just know that he killed it. I hope that on my next one he'll be involved.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/PnzLlt0Soto?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Like everything you do, the Souls of Mischief album has a concept behind it, and the concept is that it's set in 1994. Does that dismiss everything they've done since 93 'til Infinity?</b> <b>They'll forever be known for that record, so could you see how people might see this as the 'follow up' to that first album?</b></div><div>That's a good question, and to me, it kind of is. To me, 93 is the best album they've done, so I wanted to take it back to that time and feel like young soldiers again. I wanted them to feel that hunger. I wanted to take it back to 93 'til Infinity and make an album that is based on that time frame. I guess you could kinda say that it is a follow up, in a way. But that's just me saying that, not necessarily them. It's amazing to me that after 21 years in the game, they can still come so hard. I'm really proud of them, really proud of what they've done, and I hope people enjoy it.<br /><b><br /></b></div><div><b>They did kind of falter after 93 'til Infinity, do you think <i>they</i> see it as the follow up?</b></div><div>None of us have ever said that this is a follow up, but it does have that feeling. You know what I'm saying? It feels like a follow up because 93 'til Infinity is their best work, and now we have this album, and - at least for myself - I know it's <i>my</i> best work. I think it's their best work. But we've never said it.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>It's like they've finally made a proper second album.</b></div><div>It feels like that, man. It just feels really good. We're really proud of it. A lot of what went into the making of this goes back to when they were making 93 'til Infinity, when they were a team, in the studio together.</div><div><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/vkPaQjh7eUc?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Do you think they could ever be a collective like Hieroglyphics again?</b></div><div>All of them are really, really talented, you know? As long as they keep the fire, as long as they have the passion, they could do whatever they want to. They have the ability to. On this Souls of Mischief album now, I believe it's the best they've ever been lyrically in their lives. That's how much I believe in this album.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Is it right that you worked in music law in the past?</b></div><div>Oh, yeah. I have a law degree so I served as an entertainment law professor. For me, it really helps me out with business, because I know all the legal documents and how they apply to music and all that stuff. It's really helped me out. It's not a big deal to me.<br /><b><br /></b></div><div><b>I kinda wondered if that was why you learned to play instruments, like, maybe you were worried about the legality of sampling.</b></div><div>No, that was a creative thing. I love music that samples also, but for me, creatively, live instruments were where I was at. Where I'm at.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>What have you got lined up for the rest of the year?</b></div><div>I'll be doing another Ghostface album. I have an album I'm doing with Ali Shaheed Muhammad of A Tribe Called Quest. There's another few things I've got in the works. I'm doing another Something About April album. But more importantly just my Linear Labs label, trying to make that big. I want people to look at it like a lifestyle brand that people feel speaks to them musically. We're not chasing money, we just want to make good music.</div></div></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2014/09/adrian-younge.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-1058007968630391052Fri, 06 Jun 2014 08:03:00 +00002014-06-06T03:18:26.437-07:00Dan SartainDJ BonebreakTescoThird ManDan Sartain<b>There's no real evidence for it, but it is <i>scientific fact</i> that listening to Dan Sartain's music will make you a better person. The Alabama rockabilly-punk-blues troubadour has a new album (his eighth) - the brilliant <i>Dudesblood</i> - out now on One Little Indian.</b><b><br /></b><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-yW-WT7SL2y8/U5FwsTVj3GI/AAAAAAAAAdQ/MDTk40d0xrg/s1600/DAN11.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-yW-WT7SL2y8/U5FwsTVj3GI/AAAAAAAAAdQ/MDTk40d0xrg/s1600/DAN11.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a><span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>&nbsp;</i></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Dan Sartain by Hayley Grimes</i></span><b> </b></div><br /><br /><b>Hi Dan.</b><br />Dan Sartain! That's my name! Don't wear it out! Sorry... I've been watching a lot of David Lee Roth interviews.<br /><br /><b>Right on, that's cool. I've got my hopes up for this now.</b><br />He's so funny man. He's got lines for days and days.<br /><br /><b>The new record sounds like you've gone and written some hits, and it's got a cover of a Knife song on it. The last guy that covered the Knife got famous... Was that you plan?</b><br />Who was that? What song?<b> </b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/nfNXgAysFd8?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>That guy </b><b>José González covered 'Heartbeats', and it got used on a Sony TV ad, and he got really huge.</b><br />I know the song but I haven't heard the cover. Advertisements are kind of the monetary success that you hope for these days. It used to be that that was the most uncool thing ever, you know? Bands would really pride themselves on rejecting corporations and things like that. Then later on, to a lesser extent, you would hear bands kinda brag about this. Like, somebody wanted one of their songs and they said "no!" It's still cool to tell politicians "no", especially if it's a lame politician. Why started that..? Woody Guthrie, I think, then Bruce Springsteen perpetuated it when some politician wanted to use his song and he said no. Nowadays the people who do advertisements have better taste than the people who run the radio. You see and hear Iggy Pop on advertisements, you don't hear him on the radio! At least not over here.<br /><b><br /></b><b>He did that car insurance ad over here, did you get that?</b><br />It was really funny! He's like "I don't trust car insurance to just anybody!" Haha! People were mad about that. People are mad over here, this week, people are grumpy because they used some Pixies song on an iPhone ad or something like that. You just gotta get over it, we can't have it both ways where music is free and musicians aren't compensated for anything. Maybe musicians don't deserve to make as much money as they have in the past...<b><br /></b><b>&nbsp;</b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/KdcG-JHwMEQ?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Pixies and the Stooges both reformed for money, it's not like these bands don't exist as businesses.</b> <b>But yeah, that José González cover was definitely the first time a lot of people heard the Knife.</b> <b>How did you get from you last album to this new one?</b><br />The last album was kind of a... I don't want to call it a 'concept album', because when people say that they usually mean Tommy by The Who or something. The last album wasn't a concept album in the traditional sense, I was just trying to write a record for the Ramones, and I was thinking largely about Richie Ramone, who was their drummer in the mid-80s. He kind of got offered the job out of the blue, and with the job came a lot of writing, and lifting a lot of weight, because Joey was sick at the time and everybody was kinda mad with Johnny but they all wanted to keep the band going. So in a lot of ways, in his short time with the band, that guy was the driving force of the band. I just wanted to imagine, "What if I got that kinda call?" To join one of your favourite bands and be a major part of it. I kinda fantasy-casted myself as one of the Ramones, and wondered what kind of album I'd write. Obviously it's impossible now. So I did that, but it was hard coming out of that. When we started to put the wheels in motion to do this album, I had contacted Richie Ramone. We did a song together, and we talked about working some more, but it didn't flesh out. At the time it wasn't a fantasy anymore, writing an album with the actual person. So I could write an album of mine with him in mind, with that speed and intensity. I still had those songs, so instead I got DJ Bonebreak from X. X are a huge influence to me. They hit me harder and a lot longer than the Ramones did. I saw this documentary that had footage of them doing 'Johnny Hit and Run Paulene', that I later found was from The Decline of Western Civilization, and I thought they were the coolest people in the world.<br /><b><br /></b><b>It changed you!</b><br />Definitely. I've always loved them. So while I'm cold-calling heroes of mine to see if they'll play on this record, I wondered what DJ Bonebreak was doing. I figured he would charge a lot more, because he was the only constant member, and he's played on side-projects, and everybody in the band seems to love him. The fall out with each other, but they love DJ! And I can see why. I sent him the tracks, and we would speak briefly, and he always sent something back that was better than what I was envisioning.<b></b><br /><b><br /></b><b></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="https://ytimg.googleusercontent.com/vi/13_NnEsiqTM/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/13_NnEsiqTM&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/13_NnEsiqTM&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b>And that's how <i>Dudesblood</i> came to be?</b><br />Pretty much! I wasn't planning on it being so marimba-heavy, but I figured that if I have this guy at my disposal, and he's so good at all that... I started thinking of different stuff. The Knife song, I love that. I listen to songs on repeat, and it drives people around me crazy.<br /><b><br /></b><b>That's because you're a fan of really short songs.</b><br />Yeah! Haha! I don't listen to much prog. But I would play that song on repeat until I realised there was something morbid and weird that wasn't on the surface about it. It dawned on me what it was; the singer wasn't the subject of the song. It's a female voice saying the stuff, but I put two and two together, and learned more about the band, found out the were a brother and sister duo, then it kind of made sense. I still don't really know what the song is about. I've been told it was about a stalker, but I assumed it was maybe about a letter or something that the sister got. Or some drunk person chewing her ear off backstage, and they were just kind of mocking this person! I dunno. But it's not straight ahead storytelling.<br /><b><br /></b><b>So did you try to write hits for this record?</b><br />Kinda. Obviously a song like 'Dudesblood' or 'Smash The Tesco' aren't really going to fly with some markets. In one I'm screaming "Fucked in the face with a chainsaw" and the other I'm screaming "I'll throw a Molotov right through the fucking glass". The song 'You Gotta Get Mad To Get Things Done' was absolutely recorded with the radio in mind. It features Misty Miller on vocals. She's a young singer from London with a seemingly bright future ahead of her. It features DJ Bonebrake on drums and marimba. He's a full on legend. I wanted that song to have something for old punks and young bucks in one setting. I'm kinda in the middle of that. The label liked the Knife cover for the first single. Can't say I saw that coming, but I don't find that decision to be disagreeable. 'You Gotta Get Mad' was the "I want to keep my job song", though. I was trying to think like Tom Petty or Elvis Costello or something. It's not my favorite song, but it feels like the most presentable one. To answer your question, ever since the first Swami album, we have wanted to be contenders for whatever it is everyone else wants. I failed at sports before I was a musician. I look at music like a sport, a competition. I want to win, but I have to eat it like a pro when we don't.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/IeUbqbcNjGA?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div></div><div><br /><br /><b>Since you talked about fantasising about writing for the Ramones, is there a movie you'd like to write a soundtrack for? Maybe something where the actual soundtrack sucks.</b><br />Rumble Fish. I love that movie, and I hate that soundtrack. Stewart Copeland? Did he watch the movie he was making the soundtrack for?! I mean, I understand he was being adventurous and using an instrument people hadn't used to score films with, but man, it just ruins the film. I would love to do that, even on a fan edit level, do an alternate soundtrack to Rumble Fish. God, it's so good! Matt Dillon in his prime?! Mickey Rourke in his prime?! Who was the girl from the Fabulous Stains... Diane Lane! Nic Cage looking cool and young?! Rumble Fish is a <i>perfect</i> movie! I mean, it has Tom Waits in it, and I'm not the biggest Tom Waits fan, but if you have Tom Waits at your disposal and you're making a movie like that? I would way rather there was a Tom Waits soundtrack than what Stewart Copeland did. Stewart Copeland's soundtrack is just goofy on that, and it takes me out of it, and it doesn't match the scenes at all. That's a good question and one that I'm happy to have a definitive answer for.<br /><b><br /></b><b>You did an 'Ask Me Anything' thing on Reddit, and seemed quite surprised how nobody was a dick to you. Why?</b><br />It's the internet, you know? I'm guilty of it too, because I'm a fan of stuff. I was just on the internet just now, ripping on Van Halen. I love David Lee Roth, and people always act like those two <i>need</i> each other. I was like "No, it's a one-way street! David Lee Roth's solo stuff is better than Van Halen because it's him in his prime going off the chain!" I thought people were just gonna be like "How many dicks do you suck?" I dunno, a lot? Haha! I expected them to go crazy on me.<br /><br /><b>That reminds me of a lyric on the new record... Have you <i>actually</i> stuck your penis in a glory hole?</b><br />Hahaha! No comment! I will say this, with the last record, and this record, things have just become funny. I'm going to need to write a sincere record. Since that last record, and this record, everything's kind of a joke.<br /><b><br /></b><b>But why? You play punk rock music.</b><br />Yeah. I guess not. When I was doing the whole Ramones thing, I felt like a lot of bands did that. There have been whole record labels of bands that rip off the Ramones, but oftentimes the miss how funny they were. Joey was pretty sincere in a lot of those love lyrics, but to us it was just funny how there's this giant guy with a funny accent who's really sincerely in love. I think people often miss the mark with them. Even the Misfits, people always associate Danzig with being a stupid tough guy, but those lyrics were pretty funny. I don't think it's that funny to see him carrying around cat food, because I think that dude is pretty funny, and he has a good sense of humour, and it's probably a lot of other people misinterpreting him.</div><div></div><div></div><div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-KsDt-TZrwOs/U5FyjxzRSyI/AAAAAAAAAdg/Ir5vh5ktvOE/s1600/glenn-danzig-kitty-litter.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-KsDt-TZrwOs/U5FyjxzRSyI/AAAAAAAAAdg/Ir5vh5ktvOE/s1600/glenn-danzig-kitty-litter.jpg" height="320" width="238" /></a><b>&nbsp;</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>As if Glenn Danzig doesn't feed his cat cat food.</b>&nbsp;</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Right! Haha!<b>&nbsp;</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>What were the Toe Rag versions you did about?</b>&nbsp;</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">What's that? Sorry, I'm at the store...<b>&nbsp;</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>You're not at Tesco, are you?</b>&nbsp;</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Hahaha! No. I was hoping that would come up. That song, 'Smash The Tesco', is about my English friends who have a tendency to want to riot. Last time I was over there, they were rioting against Tesco. We were in Bristol, I think, and the students were smashing Tescos. I think it's cool, I mean, I wish Americans would riot more. Against consumerism, against Americanism. But when I'm actually in the UK, Tesco is actually a kind of a relief! Like, it's not that much of a threat. They don't make the Daily Sport any more, but I'll go in there and get some sport magazine with titties, and maybe some sunflower seeds, and a chocolate egg with a little toy inside it. It doesn't seem like that big of a deal, but out in the street they're like "Fuck the Tesco!" and they're smashing the shit out of it. It's funny to me; I live in a town that's pretty much nothing but strip malls. It's awful! If my English friends could see that..! Tesco is so quaint, and necessary, compared to Walmart, which is obscene. Walmart is so big, and such a huge cog in the wheel, that they don't even chase after you if you've shoplifted less than $10 worth of stuff. Like it costs more in manpower for them to fill out the paperwork to catch a shoplifter if they've stolen less than $10 worth. So basically anything under $10 is free at Walmart if you have the guts to take it. They aren't going to go after you. I stole some sewing needles this week. I needed to sew up my jacket. Haha!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><iframe frameborder="no" height="450" scrolling="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/145161596&amp;auto_play=false&amp;hide_related=false&amp;show_comments=true&amp;show_user=true&amp;show_reposts=false&amp;visual=true" width="100%"></iframe> <b>&nbsp;</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>Have you ever eaten horse? Or any other domestic creature?</b>&nbsp;</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Yeah, I have. Over in Europe. I had horse on a pizza over in German, and it was really good. At an Italian restaurant.<b>&nbsp;</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>That was a thing that upset people about Tesco; they sold horse meat but told people it was cow meat. Beef, I mean.</b>&nbsp;</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Oh wow! They did that somewhere here too, they found out there was horse meat in something. But then I remembered eating horse and it was pretty good! Haha!<b>&nbsp;</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>You'd think it would be harder to get horse meat. You'd think they'd be harder to keep, and breed, and catch, than a field of cows lying around.</b>&nbsp;</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">They're lean too. It would take some work to get meat off of a horse.</div><br /><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="https://ytimg.googleusercontent.com/vi/8OEj_zRc2eg/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/8OEj_zRc2eg&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/8OEj_zRc2eg&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><div></div><div><br /><b>What do you think of Record Shop Day?</b></div><div>For my own interests, it's good. I'm more of an enthusiast about movies really. I stay away from music blogs and things of that nature. I get more from movie blogs, and I get into rumours, and making-of things, and I probably believe things that aren't true, and I probably perpetuate lies I've heard on the internet about movies. I understand the fan-dom behind it, it's cool.<br /><b><br /></b></div><div><b>Is it fair to say that you're bigger in the UK than you are in a lot of other places?</b></div><div>Yeah. It's been like that for a long time. It makes it harder to get money, because it all goes back into the production of it, and buying plane tickets. Sometimes you just want to save some money or tour with local musicians. When I'm over there I feel like I'm being spoiled and humbled at the same time. Sometimes it'll be the best of anything I've ever had, and sometimes you don't get my creature comforts, and you're being a whiny baby because you don't get orange cheese and yellow mustard.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>A mutual friend of ours, Bryan McGarvey, told me I better not mention the Third Man thing, or you turning records into ashtrays. So tell me about that.</b></div><div>I didn't like the record that I did with them, and I would up with hundreds of 'em. I feel like there was a little bit of a lack of quality control with them. With that label.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Is that Jack White, or the people he employs? You'd think a boutique label like that would be on it.</b></div><div>Jack gets the final say, as far as I know. It's weird, because I'm friends with all those guys. There's a couple of guys named Ben, one of them used to play with the Soledad Brothers and the other Ben was from the Dirtbombs. I know those guys from touring and I know Jack from touring, and they've always seeked me out! I mean, I liked the White Stripes when they came out, and I still like the White Stripes. Some of it. But I was never like "Oh wow, I gotta get my music to these guys!" I kept getting calls from them, and they seemed like cool, nice guys. I've played music with all those guys. It's cool that Jack is getting people into collecting records, but I just felt that mine wasn't very good. I think it's a little ridiculous, I mean they can spend their money however they want, but that people are spending a <i>lot</i> of money on these limited editions. I have these records sitting around, these tri-coloured records, these Halloween editions, all this stuff, and they're just sitting in my closet and I'm ashamed of them. Kind of to prove a point I just melted them into bowls and put them on eBay. I made like a thousand dollars, selling these guys melted records. Idiots. I had the standard versions, and I sold those at the merch tables for like $5. I you made me laugh I would just give it to you. $5 is an investment or whatever, but to spend $50 on a melted record? You're an idiot.</div><div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="https://ytimg.googleusercontent.com/vi/gLAEQ_APsE0/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/gLAEQ_APsE0&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/gLAEQ_APsE0&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><div></div><div><br /><b>People who call themselves 'record collectors' are the worst. Buy the music, don't collect the item.</b> <b>You don't need the same thing three times.</b></div><div>Yeah. I went through a thing a few years ago when I was collecting a lot of action figures, and it became obsessive. Those people are the same way. With toys, the only good thing is that you can touch them and hold them and stuff! These guys want them in the package, and the package to be pristine.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>And it has to have the right barcode on it, before they can put it away in a box in a cupboard that nobody will ever see.</b></div><div>Yeah, exactly. They would label these people as 'card-benders'. They would go into the retail shops and find the toys on the pegs, and they knew that they were collectors' items, and they would bend the cards, so that when the collector would get to it they'd be like "Aargh! I can't buy this, the card is bent!" I became one of those people. Eventually I just became a troll. An internet troll and a real-life troll of toy collectors. I found that you could buy these toys, take them out of the box, keep the toy and put in a different toy from a charity shop or something, then take it back to the store and get a full refund. Haha! They would put these charity shop toys back on the shelf, so you'd go back into the store and see the wrong toy in the box. Haha! I was in this toy collector community, and they'd post pictures of these on the internet and say "I can't believe how somebody could do this" and I'd be like "I know, it's terrible". Hahaha!<br /><b><br /></b></div><div><b>What are your plans for the year, after the record comes out and after this tour?</b></div><div>Well, when I got out of toy collecting I got a vintage car, a '57 Plymouth. I always loved the car but I'm getting to where I can't keep it up any more. It sucks but I gotta let her go. I think I sold the car to this guy in Australia, and I'm kinda dating a girl in San Fransisco. I'm a little too early for my midlife crisis and a little too late for my quarter-life crisis. I think I already had that. I hope I did, anyway. If that wasn't it, I'm fucked. But I'm selling the car and I'm gonna try and move out west. I'm buying a mototcycle. I've never been on a motorcycle before.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Be careful, man.</b></div>Yeah. Yeah. Well I quit smoking, I quit drinking and I quit hard drugs. I gotta increase the likelihood of an untimely death, that I've worked so hard for. If things keep going like this I'm gonna live forever and I'm gonna see all my friends die. Now I'm looking at living in a world where Ghostbusters die, and where members of Devo die. You know? I'm not OK with this! Beastie Boys are dying. Dude, I gotta do something to get outta here before I see everybody I love go away! Haha! I may as well get on a fuckin' motorcycle and drive to San Francisco. I'm way too safe in a car!<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-RkufPaE0iqI/U5GUFFrPusI/AAAAAAAAAd4/YDMlI5UQPoU/s1600/DAN3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-RkufPaE0iqI/U5GUFFrPusI/AAAAAAAAAd4/YDMlI5UQPoU/s1600/DAN3.jpg" height="320" width="213" /></a></div></div><div></div><div><div class="yj6qo ajU"><div class="ajR" data-tooltip="Show trimmed content" id=":q8" role="button" tabindex="0"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="ajR" data-tooltip="Show trimmed content" id=":q8" role="button" style="text-align: center;" tabindex="0"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><i><img class="ajT" src="https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/images/cleardot.gif" />Dudesblood is out now on One Little Indian.</i></span></div></div></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2014/06/dan-sartain.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-787706953537279450Mon, 05 May 2014 09:18:00 +00002014-05-05T02:18:19.074-07:00A Band Called DeathDeathDetroitDrag CityMC5StoogesDeath<b>The story of the hard rock band Death is a story that has taken decades to unfold and, in a twist no one saw coming, isn’t over yet. The Hackney brothers, Bobby Sr. and Dannis, thought Death was done not long after they moved from Detroit to Vermont more than 30 years ago, especially after their brother and musical mentor, David, died of lung cancer in 2000.<br /> Around a year ago, rare copies of Death 7-inch vinyl records began selling for unbelievable prices on the internet to music collectors who recognized the group as the pre-punk innovator that it was. One fan passed his excitement and the band’s songs on to Chicago-based Drag City Records, who went on to release the first-ever Death album, 38 years after the group began.<br /> The Hackneys grew up in Detroit as the city was becoming famous for its Motown sound, and started in 1971 as a funk/rhythm-and-blues group. David steered the brothers toward another style coming out of Detroit, the noisy garage-rock sound being produced by the likes of the MC5 and The Stooges. That flew in the face of what was expected of young black musicians in Motown.</b> <b>For a more detailed background, find and see the movie 'A Band Called Death'. It's awesome.</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-RTXoGOy6muQ/U2dUCPjxE_I/AAAAAAAAAcs/21URRp2NCRw/s1600/Death1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-RTXoGOy6muQ/U2dUCPjxE_I/AAAAAAAAAcs/21URRp2NCRw/s1600/Death1.jpg" height="225" width="400" /></a></div><b><b><br />Hey guys. Introduce yourselves, please.</b><br /> </b>Bobby H: I'm Bobby Hackney, I'm the bassist and vocalist with the band Death.<br />Dennis H: I'm Dennis Hackney, I'm the drummer.<br />Bobbie D: I'm Bobbie Duncan, I'm the guitarist.<b><br /><br /><b>The press release for this record says you've come full-circle, but it seems more triangular. There are three clear moments in Death's history; when the band formed, when the 7" was discovered, and then now. Is it really going in a circle?</b> <b>Have you come round to the beginning again, because you're a band again, playing these songs?</b><br /> </b>BH: It's full-circle, but it's also triangular. We really concentrate on that triangle, because with the band, that was David's concept. As much as we used to hear all his concepts about the triangle, we can really <i>feel</i> it now. Because it's all in place. When someone leaves you, you always feel like they're above you. You never see anybody look down to talk to a person that's left. They always look up. So David is at the top of that triangle, and here we are, down here, doin' our thing. Basically what you said is the spirit of Death. It's a spiritual, mental, physical trip, man.<b><br /> <br /><b>At the beginning of Death, you were making this ferocious, angry, raw, protest music. What were you angry about? You were talented musicians living in Detroit at the end of the '60s!</b> <b>It must have been amazing there, at that time.<br /> </b></b>BH: Hahaha!<br />D: We were angry about trying to maintain the identity that we wanted. We were angry because people around us didn't accept it. We were angry because we tried to do things that other rock bands did, but it didn't work out for us. We'd try to book ourselves in a club and either we was too fast, too unknown, or in a few cases too black. What you see now is just a continuation of what we wanted to do. If Dave had not been taken away, what you see would be a completion of what he wanted to do. Just continuing on from when the music got picked up, discovered.<b><b> </b></b><br /><b><b><br /></b></b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/R5Pf3MlUo7c?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b><b>How much did David's death affect where you are now? If you didn't have David's legacy to think about, would we be having this conversation?</b></b><br />BH: We were basically musicians from the time that we decided to play instruments, in 1969. We set out on a mission to play music. Our mission was to play music for life with each other. When that didn't work out, me and Dennis carried on in the hope that David would re-join us in some shape, form or fashion one day. We went through a lot of pain, watching his demise, but now it goes back to the full-circle thing. Because it feels like he's here with us just now. He just transcends the whole situation here. His spirit is our spirit, and vice-versa. When the music was discovered and people were asking if we could play Death music again, at the time we had been playing reggae music for over twenty years! We didn't know ourselves whether we could play Death again! One of the things that helped us get back into that focus was that me and Dennis would spend days on end talking about the things we had planned in that room in Detroit, and the things that we wanted to do. We realised that we may have an opportunity to do them. That was a real inspiration to get back into the music. That's what makes it so much fun. We left a lot of fun on the table in Detroit, man. It's beautiful to be able to pick it back up.<b><br /> <br /><b>It was written somewhere that you "changed your name to 4th Movement", but surely 4th Movement was a different band? You didn't change the name of the band, did you?</b></b><br />BH: Hahaha! You gotta understand, we were Death from 1973 all the way to 1980. It was around that time that we had been through so much rejection, that David finally came up with another name for the band. We had moved to Vermont, we'd tried to introduce the town to Death, and they thought we were bringing a gang from Detroit. It was after so much rejection, and under David's guidance, that we became 4th Movement. He actually did a funny twist on that, because the triangle he had, there were four dots on it and the fourth one represented the guiding spirit. So he said "OK, we're not gonna be Death, but this is how we're gonna hold onto Death. We're gonna be called the 4th Movement." Because that's what death is - the fourth movement. You have a spiritual, mental, physical life; then you go to the fourth movement.<b><br /> <br /><b>An extension of Death.</b></b><br />BH: An extension of Death! Exactly. David put a lot of elements of what we talked about with Death into that name, into the 4th Movement. That's one of the reasons we embraced it so much. We still went through a lot of rejection as 4th Movement, because it was a gospel-oriented rock n' roll band. Everybody loved the music, but they just couldn't get around the words. We were the 4th Movement, but we were still rough and rugged, you know? Doin' our Death stuff on the side! Haha!<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/Q2FwIY7o3-c?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b><b>How big a thing was it to start operating under a different name, after so long? Was it like conceding?</b> <b>Or was it bringing an end to Death?</b></b><br />BH: It wasn't that we wanted to change the name for that reason. The great thing about Death, and all these groups that we were in, was that we loved each other, and we loved playing music with each other. We loved creating. We really wanted to be big, and we really believed that we would be heard one day, but it was really about the art. Especially with David. David was always confident, David was "This is gonna happen, man. This is gonna happen". You couldn't shake him. A bad gig wouldn't shake him, losing a contract wouldn't shake him, he was always adamant about the fact that "It's not us that's crazy, it's them".<b><br /> <br /><b>Did the changes in the music you were making reflect changes in the music you were listening to at the time?</b> <b>You always say you were turned on to heavy music by Alice Cooper, and there's definitely the Stooges and the MC5 in there too, but were you listening to other stuff when 4th Movement came about?<br /> </b></b>BH: Yeah. We were always writing about the things that we felt. Rock n' roll was the voice, man. And it still is, if radio and the public let it be. You can still hear that voice. It's like a watchtower cry. You know? War is not right, we live in a corrupt system - and it's not just one system, it's the world system. When there's a man in the street, sleeping in front of a mansion, it's that contrast that makes rock n' roll the voice of any generation. That's what we were into. If anybody knows rock history, it's America. There were two years that were very pivotal - 1967 and 1968. In 1967 you had magical things that happened at a concert for the first time; you had Otis Redding, Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin on the same stage, you know?! It was a big festival <i>(the Monterey Pop Festival)</i>, and nobody had ever seen a festival like that before in music. And that inspired the next festival, which was the biggest one, that was Woodstock. With Sly and the Family Stone, Country Joe and the Fish, Richie Havens, The Who and Hendrix and everybody! But the whole message was peace and love, the whole message was "power to the people!" We were against the war in Vietnam, man. Nobody wanted to get drafted and yet we had a president in the White House who was adamant about continuing a failure of a war. You see that all around the world today. Rock n' roll has always been that cry. I mean, we loved The Beatles when they first came out, the first three or four years when they were soft and cuddly and everything, the bubblegum time. But man, when those guys came out with Sgt. Pepper in 1967 and when John Lennon was the real watchtower voice, he was demonstrating to the world that something wasn't right. That's what we tuned into, that's what affected us. And it was just a great music to dance around to, to jump to! Rock n' roll, man!<br />DH:<b> </b>All the way from back then, to groups like Pussy Riot. You talk about a "watchtower voice", those are watchtower voices. Those girls are on the front line. They take the crap that we talk about. In America and Europe, we enjoy a certain amount of freedom. We can say what we want and we can do what we want but over they they can't say what they want. They can't even play rock n' roll. I want to give a shout out to those girls, I want to tell them to keep on keepin' on, and I hope you can make it to America one day.<b><br />&nbsp;<b></b></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Qn0ICfRLt8I/U2dU-BkFBxI/AAAAAAAAAc0/q_8St5InAuA/s1600/Death2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Qn0ICfRLt8I/U2dU-BkFBxI/AAAAAAAAAc0/q_8St5InAuA/s1600/Death2.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></div><br /><b><b>When people like Jello Biafra and Henry Rollins started talking about how good you guys are, did it make you re-evaluate the music you made in the past?</b></b><br />BH: It made me fall off my chair! That's a whole generation for me, because my sons grew up listening to those dudes. That was the music all the skateboarders would listen to. Bobbie was turning me on to Henry Rollins, Bad Brains, Gorilla Biscuits... Groups like Dead Kennedys, Black Flag. People say we "pre-dated the punk sound", but we didn't. You see, in 1974 the word "punk" wasn't even phrased yet. It was rock n' roll. In Detroit, if you called someone a punk, you got either one of two things - a bloody nose or a black eye. We just called it hard-drivin' Detroit rock n' roll. We did hear a lot of those bands that came along as part of the punk era, and some of that stuff reminded us of some of the stuff we did in Detroit, you know?<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>When US punk started to change and evolve, around 1980, were you aware? Did you care?</b> <b>Things moved away from spiky hair and spitting...</b><br />BH: We were doing reggae music, but through my son and his friends, through the skateboard fraternity, we were hearing a lot of that music. Things were getting faster, and the lyrics were changing. We used to say to our sons, "You know, me and your dad were in a rock n' roll band in Detroit", and they would go "Yeah dad, whatever", because they had never heard the Death stuff.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Did you ever point out that you were playing that music long before those guys?</b><br />BH: I never said "long before", I'd just kinda say "This reminds me of a band me and your uncles were in, in Detroit". They would just look at me, because all they had heard was the reggae stuff. Haha!<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>So from the 7" getting passed to Drag City, how long was it before you started to notice things changing?</b><br />DH: That was quite a transition, man. The west coast record collectors and the underground DJs was what made us take notice. We'd get calls about what we used to do, about the old recordings, and we'd just pass it off, like "Yeah, it's just some collector looking for a record". Then we got the news from Bobby's son Julian that these guys were actually playing the records at parties and stuff, it kind of took us by surprise. That's when the whole scenario changed, when his son realised that we were in a <i>good</i> rock n' roll band! Hahaha! That kinda brings up your cool-level with your kids! We were definitely enjoying a new level of cool. We never told them about the bad things, just the good things!<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZcRhnSEwVlo?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>How come there's such little footage of you guys from way back?</b><br />BH: I wish we had more live footage, man. We just didn't get much of a chance to play live that much. Or at all. David tried to book us at some shows, but this time he booked us at an all-black cabaret, at a Masonic temple. Hahaha! They were working people, factory workers, and they want to hear stuff like Al Green and Aretha Franklin and B.B. King, they want to hear blues and stuff. This was a packed house, and it was bring-your-own-bottle. So we're up playing the blues, and then we go into our Death stuff, and after every song you could hear a pin drop. We'd be playing rock n' roll, then go into this crescendo, end the song like BANG, then it would be silent. You could hear the mice running around. Hahaha! I wish we had footage of us playing, but back in the 70s nobody was recording anything unless you had a big production going on or something like that. It was hard for us to get a gig that we wanted. One of the rock clubs did give us a show, but it was on a <span class="aBn" data-term="goog_737761018" tabindex="0"><span class="aQJ">Monday</span></span> night, outside of Detroit, in Ann Arbor. There were only two couples on the floor dancing. They were older couples, but at least they were dancing! The promoter said to us at the end of the night that we were a good band, but we had to change the name. We heard that a lot!<br />DH: It wasn't a name you wanted to put on a marquee.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>It's the best name ever.</b><br />BH: We waited a whole generation to hear that! Hahaha! Every time somebody would ask for the name of the band, it was like David just could not wait for this opportunity. He would just put this face on and say "DEATH". Just to see the reaction. People on the phone would think we were making a prank call.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>It says a lot that you guys stuck with the name, and struggled with it, rather than just listening to the first person that told you to change it.</b> <b>I doubt that would happen nowadays. Do you think there's ever going to be a musical revolution again?</b><br />BH: Radio kind of blocked out everybody. That was one of our frustrations when we were putting those records out. Up until a few years before, you would be able to go up with the acetate, straight from the record pressing plant, go right to the disc jockey, and they'd play it. That's how a lot of hits were born in Detroit. By the time we put out our little single, the radio stations were going really corporate and disco was taking over. A lot of rock acts defected to disco! It was a weird time, the mid-seventies. So as long as people embrace it. I think with the technology, it's not something anybody would be able to stop. It's going to be interesting to see what happens. I was watching television the other day and they were advertising the new YouTube single! And the adverts used to say "Get it at Sears! Get it at Walmart! Get it here! Get it there! Get it wherever!" Now it just says "Download it from iTunes". And these are just the big companies. I sure hope there is a musical revolution. And I hope it's good!<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Am I right that you guys are making new music again?</b><br />BD: As a matter of fact we are. We released a single by the name of Relief, and that's on the album which is dropping later this year. There's also a Death archive album out now, called the III, the third installment.<br />BH: There's some new stuff on there as well as a flavour of what we did in the past. It's gonna be a great year for music for Death, man! We're just continuing on what Death set out to do. Real rock n' roll! It's been so long now, we don't care about being accepted, we can do what we want! Rock n' roll, alright?! Hahaha!<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-4xuNhYjCakg/U2dWt7LEiiI/AAAAAAAAAdA/vDKRDZXEb9k/s1600/ABCD.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-4xuNhYjCakg/U2dWt7LEiiI/AAAAAAAAAdA/vDKRDZXEb9k/s1600/ABCD.jpg" height="640" width="432" /></a></div><br />http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2014/05/death.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-4438540402318505678Tue, 11 Feb 2014 09:57:00 +00002014-02-13T09:49:27.831-08:00Coke FloatFatCatGlasgowPAWSThrasherPAWS<b>Channeling Sebadoh, Dinosaur Jr&nbsp; and Archers of Loaf into an impassioned cacophony of noise, melody and lyrical sincerity; Phil, Ryan and Josh of PAWS left behind their various backwater hometowns of rural Scotland to thrash it out in Glasgow before signing to Transatlantic indie uber-label Fat Cat. Having just returned from their latest US tour - a trip that also saw them record their second album in upstate New York - I spoke to singer Phil, bassist Ryan and drummer Josh about musical epiphanies, snobbery in skateboarding, posers, existentialism and death.</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Bf8alWicx6o/Uvd-bvL2csI/AAAAAAAAAb4/RAjapbkyeco/s1600/PAWS.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Bf8alWicx6o/Uvd-bvL2csI/AAAAAAAAAb4/RAjapbkyeco/s1600/PAWS.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Ryan, Phil and Josh. San Francisco, 2013. </span><b><b><br /></b></b></div><br /><b><b>You've just flown back from LA. How was America?</b></b><br />Phil: It was great. We flew out on the first of November to New York, so we were in this place called Highland Mills about an hour outside Manhattan, where our label boss Adam has a house out in the woods, and he has a log cabin thing in his garden that has a recording studio in it. We were there for the first two weeks recording our new album. We'd been talking about going over there to record our record for a couple of months now so it was cool to actually get it done and know that we had a tour to go straight into after we'd finished it. It was a headline tour, and we started in Philadelphia and did a run of east coast shows, then we made our way over to the west coast. We'd never been to the west coast before.<b><br /> <br /><b>You'd been to the east coast before?</b></b><br />P: We'd done two other tours this year, that was our third tour of the US this year. Two east coast tours. One in March, then we went to South By South West at the same time, then in June we went back and did another east coast run. The plan was to get us out to the west coast before the end of the year, there was a bunch of people out there who hadn't seen us before that wanted to see us play. We did like 5,500 miles in three weeks. Our tour manager Brendan was like a superhero, he was just pedal to the metal every day. One day he had to drive from Seattle to San Fransisco, and that's a sixteen hour drive... <br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/i4iVtiVc0pI?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b><b>Fat Cat have got offices in Brighton and in New York. Seems like they're quite keen to push you to America.</b> <b>Are you more appreciated there?</b></b><br />Josh: Probably because America's so vast. You just have to hammer it. We've done so much in the UK that we just want to do America now.<br /><div><div><div>P: Being on a label with presence in America definitely helps. I can't even think how many shows we've played in the UK in the last couple of years. Hundreds. First time we went to London there were 30 people there, but then you go back, and you build it. It was surreal, in March we went to New York and there were 80 or 90 people at our first show there. I think because we did well on our first trip there, they wanted to keep getting us back. We're getting loads of good press over there, which could be because we've played with a lot of bands from America when they've come over here. Our first ever show was opening for Sub Pop band Dum Dum Girls. Then every show we got offered seemed to be with American bands.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>You sound like an American band, but in a good way. You sound like lots of good American stuff.</b></div><div>P: Sometimes my voice comes out a bit American, but I think that's just from hanging about with a lot of them. And I guess it's just the music we've grown up listening to.</div><div>J: Even going back to The Beatles and the Rolling Stones, they were trying to sound like American bands.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uTmtyS3uJz0/UvnvJ5IFQLI/AAAAAAAAAcI/De5tTRZbGw4/s1600/Phillip+PAWS+Kickflip+(Stuart+Moffat).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uTmtyS3uJz0/UvnvJ5IFQLI/AAAAAAAAAcI/De5tTRZbGw4/s1600/Phillip+PAWS+Kickflip+(Stuart+Moffat).jpg" height="213" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Phil skates.</span><b><br /></b></div><br /><b>You were on <a href="http://gerrylovesrecords.com/" target="_blank">Gerry Loves Records</a> weren't you? That's not actually Gerry Love's <i>(from Teenage Fanclub)</i> record label, is it?</b></div><div>J: They love Gerry Love.</div><div>P: The guys who run Gerry Loves Records, I think they became best pals in Aberdeen, listening to Teenage Fanclub, and I think the first gig they went to together was Teenage Fanclub. They're obsessed with Teenage Fanclub. They're the best guys.</div><div>J: They're like our spirit guides.</div><div>P: They came to see us one night in Edinburgh, and bought us loads of beers afterwards. They're the best dudes because they just love music and care about music and don't care about any kind of label bullshit. They just release music from their friends' bands and they really care about it. Our goal with the band at that point was to get one of our songs on a 7", then we'd have done everything we wanted to do. They offered to do that so we were just totally beyond stoked. I don't think anybody would have thought anything would have gone as far as it's gone. At that point we were content with what had gone on, but when they gave us that 7" we had something to push, and tour with. They really fueled the band in a big way. There wasn't loads of press and it wasn't on a big label, but just in giving us this thing that was ours to play shows with and tell people about. It was cool to be able to pass it on to other musicians. What's the guy from the Buzzcocks called, I always forget his name...<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Pete Shelley?</b></div><div>P: Yeah, I gave a copy to Pete Shelley.</div><div>Ryan: I remember that!</div><div>P: Yeah, you were there but you weren't in the band yet.</div><div>R: Just lurking around, ever hopeful.</div><div>P: That was the cool thing about that 7", they gave us a thing so that we could let people know that we were a band. They're a really great label.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>How did you go from there to Fat Cat, this big Transatlantic label?</b></div><div>P: With Gerry Love's we were never really 'on the label' as such. I guess we were just writing and gigging so much, we had enough stuff that could potentially be an album, and we were just like "Fuck it, let's keep going and see what happens". We never really shopped around for a label, or looked for it, we just wanted to do little releases with labels. We played a showcase festival in Inverness called Go North, and Alex who runs the British side of Fat Cat, he saw us at this venue that was this terrible old man pub, called 'Flames' or something like that...</div><div>R: 'Phoenix'. I think it's now called 'Deeno's'. With two 'E's...</div><div>P: Yeah. We played in there and it was the most rowdy Inverness show we'd ever had. We'd either played in places where it was really quiet, and we'd played in our friend's skate shop, called <a href="http://www.creativeskatestore.co.uk/" target="_blank">Creative Skate Store</a>, when it got shut down after ten minutes. We had to lock half the people out. They're the best guys up here man, they're doing shit and keeping it real. Not only have they started a skate shop, they've started a place for youths in Inverness to go and hang out and have an identity. Inverness has been notorious for kids having nothing to do, but now there's a place where they can go and annoy the staff and play pool and drink tea and get to know the other kids, and they're all starting to skate. I used to work in a skate shop called North 57; I did my work experience there from school and I stayed on. When that shut down the whole skate scene in the Highlands just stopped. All these kids stopped skating and started drinking and smoking instead. The guys that run Creative have just made a go of it, they've revitalised it a million percent. They've got a skatepark coming next year.<br /><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/MiDEkoPKCkk?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>You're all from small towns, and your music seems to be very influenced by that background. How much did small town life inform the music you make now?</b></div><div>P: A hundred million percent.<b><br /> </b></div><div>J: Boringness always breeds creativity.<b><br /></b></div><div>R: I was joking about that the other day, because when we were on tour I got really excited about driving through a couple of these small towns that we knew people were from. The one I always talk about is Dayton, Ohio, where Guided By Voices and The Breeders are from<b>. </b>And also Dave Chappelle. I was so excited about driving through there, then we were there like "This is a total fucking shit hole", but of course it's a shit hole because that's the reason those guys did those bands.<b> </b>I think when you're in a small place you do feel compelled to do more.<b><br /> </b></div><div>P: I can't generalise, but I think if you live in a big city, and there's a lot of people who are like you... Say I'm a goth in Glasgow, then there's going to be other goths at school that I can relate to. If you're a goth in Tain you're getting burned at the stake. They hate you. You're more compelled to do something about it rather than just being all "Oh well, I've got my group".</div><div>R: People in cool cities still do great stuff but I think people from shit holes are more driven to do it.</div><div>P: In Tain there was literally three or four of us that were total freaks and liked that sort of thing, and we couldn't go to Inverness because there was nothing happening and we weren't old enough to go into places, so we would rent a Brownie hall or a Scout hall and put on a show that three of our friends would go to, and maybe their parents would stand at the back. And we'd be angry at them for supporting us because we were trying to do a punk thing. Haha! I think you're more compelled to do stuff if everything around you is shit. Especially if you get bullied and you're a bit different. One thing we were talking about the whole time we were away - if you're a skateboarder in America, you're cool. If you're a skateboarder here, you're scum. A lot of the reason I got into doing music was through the people I met through skateboarding.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>The music in skate videos?</b></div><div>P: Probably seventy five percent of my music tastes come from the first time I saw Sorry. Or the first time I got given the old Zero videos.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/gq8Twt40T4g?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>You released an EP called Misled Youth...</b></div><div>P: It's just a nod, but it has nothing to do with anything in that video. It's just my favourite title for a skate video, because that's exactly what it is. It always appealed to me. In the Highlands, if you're into that sort of thing, people look at you as if you are misled, a fuck up. Like if you want to roll around on a plank of wood and talk about music with your buddies, you're misled. It's not really what most people's grandparents or parents would see as normal. It was more about that. About being a freak.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Ryan, you're the new guy. How did you come to be here?</b></div><div>R: I'm from Orkney, but it was through a bunch of people that I know from Inverness that I ended up meeting Phil. It was about six years ago and we were in different bands.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>And what were the names of these bands?</b></div><div>J: Kaiser Chiefs.</div><div>R: Yeah, Kaiser Chiefs and Hard-Fi. Haha!</div><div>P: I was actually managing Chas n' Dave at that time.</div><div>R: These were the first bands we were in. Phil was about 15 and I was 19 or 20, and we were the only people there that took a smoke, so we went and hung out in the carpark. We didn't know each other but we knew everybody else from each other's band. Phil was like "I like Sonic Youth!" and I was like "Fuck! I like Sonic Youth! Do you like Dinosaur Jr?" "Yeah! I like Dinosaur Jr!" and it just kept going like this for ages and ages and he was weirded out that I knew all these bands and I was weirded out that he knew all these bands because the bands that we were playing for sounded nothing like these fucking bands. So we pretty much bonded there and then over a mutual love for all these weird bands. Eventually a few years later I bumped into Phil in Glasgow and it turned out he was starting another band, and I saw PAWS' first show at Stereo...</div><div>J: Were you at that?!</div><div>P: Were you at the first show?! That conversation I had with Ryan was the incentive for me to leave the band I was in. There was one dude in that band that liked the stuff I liked, but we were playing music like the Faint and stuff, kind of like electronic stuff.</div><div>R: Same with us.</div><div>P: It was either go to school or drop out and play in this band that I didn't really feel, but it was a bit more of an experience rather than sitting around in school. My mum was like "Fuck school, go and be in a band". So I did that but I wasn't happy, then I had that conversation with him and I realised there were more people - outwith this little group I was in - that were actually into the things I was into. So that was enough incentive to think "Well, fuck this", and move to Glasgow.</div><div>R: It was weird because I saw PAWS, and I ended up loving it, I thought it was great, and I actually ended up writing about it for a few different magazines, just local ones like The List and The Skinny. The first time I ever got a 'thank you' on the back of a CD was with these guys.</div><div>P: He even sang guest vocals with us a couple of times when he was drunk.<br /><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-e1hVkzJj0tY/UvnwUp0zhdI/AAAAAAAAAcQ/K3gAr8Pt4qk/s1600/Phil.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-e1hVkzJj0tY/UvnwUp0zhdI/AAAAAAAAAcQ/K3gAr8Pt4qk/s1600/Phil.jpg" height="320" width="240" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Phil ponders.</span><b> </b></div><br /><b>So you're like the Henry Rollins of the band, the fan who ends up joining.</b></div><div>R: That's the best thing anyone's ever said to me!<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Henry Rollins ruined Black Flag!</b></div><div>R: OK, that's the worst thing anyone's ever said to me<b>! </b>I hope I'm not going to completely ruin the band!<b> </b>Thanks Neil.<b> </b>Although Henry Rollins is a bit of a hero of mine. Although I know he can be a dick.<b> </b>So anyway they were playing a show at the GU, and for a laugh they said I should come up for the last song and basically just scream. I thought "I can do that!" We were always friends and we would see each other here and there while we were each doing other things. About six months ago I was walking home from work and I bumped into Josh's flatmate, who at the time had said about two sentences to me the whole time I knew him, and he said out of the blue "You might want to speak to Phil and Josh", and I hadn't seen those guys in a few months. He said "Matt's just left the band, I think they want you to join PAWS". So I walked in, and they had no idea I was there, and they started freaking out.</div><div>P: Matt had left the band, and it was a pretty stressful time; we were touring non-stop. We'd just come back from a European tour and a festival in Dublin that I think had destroyed Matt.</div><div>J: Because he was driving.</div><div>P: Yeah. He left and we had this American tour booked, and all this other amazing stuff, and we didn't know what we were going to do. We'd never thought about who we would want to play with because we had no idea he was going to leave. In my head the only guy that would make any sense at all would be Ryan, but we hadn't even finished discussing it by the time he came in. Because Josh's roommate had blabbed.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Because you'd told him?</b></div><div>P: Not really, we were sitting there getting drunk having a conversation about who our favourite bass players were, and we said Ryan, and then he was there about two hours later.</div><div>R: It was really good for me, because for the first half of that year I was trying really hard to do freelance writing and stuff, and I was fuckin' dying on my ass. I was struggling to pay rent. I'd just got a job in a restaurant and I'd resigned myself to spending the whole summer, and probably beyond, working in this shitty job. And then two weeks later this happened, and they're like"Do you want to come to America with us?" Three weeks after that we're in America.</div><div>P: Our first American tour with Ryan was really great. We got to play with some of our favourite bands. It seemed to make more sense with this new format, where everybody was just ready to go into it and absolutely slam it when we were playing with bands like Fucked Up and stuff.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/QAfPQo6Tv9g?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>What was the story about Ian MacKaye inviting you round?</b></div><div>P: That was so surreal. When we met Ryan he'd been interviewing people, but more so for himself, and one of those people was Ian.</div><div>R: When we were over in America and these guys were telling me all where we were going, and I was like "Holy shit, we're playing DC!" I'd interviewed Ian before... My good friend 'Ian'...<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Mine too.</b></div><div>R: Have <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/ian-mackaye.html" target="_blank">you interviewed him too</a>? Gnarly!<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>He's not an easy person to get to agree to an interview, so props.</b></div><div>R: That was the thing. I had done a few interviews before, and I was like "I wonder if I can an interview with someone I actually really like", because I got in trouble for trying to sort out my own interviews before, for other magazines because they said if I use their name and it doesn't go through it makes them look bad.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Not The Skinny?</b></div><div>R: <i>(nods)</i><b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Sophie who runs it is just brilliant, but that magazine is so terrible.</b></div><div>R: I'm glad you said that man. I once got £20 for doing a 1,200 word piece. If I did the same thing for a newspaper I would have got a couple of hundred quid.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Every album they review gets either three or four out of five. It's like they don't want to commit to anything.</b></div><div>P: Nothing's great, and nothing's shit.</div><div>J: That's basically a stupid system in the first place. You can't 'rate' something like that.</div><div>P: Why did Pitchfork give us 7.1? It's a good score, but what earned us that extra point-one?! What was the lyric that nudged it over?<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>At least the Wire describe the music. Rather than trying to mark it out of something.</b></div><div>P: Pitchfork try to do that all the time, but they fuck it up. We were laughing about Pitchfork the other day because when Transatlanticism by Death Cab For Cutie first came out the slated it, then when the reissue came out they bumped it up three points. How the fuck do you say something's shit then say it's great because it's aged?<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Sorry Ryan, go on.</b></div><div>R:After I got into trouble I thought about just doing it for myself, so I sent an email to Dischord asking how I would get in touch with Ian.</div><div>J: Ian at Dischord dot com?</div><div>R: Haha! Yeah. I got a reply back saying "Hi Ryan, this is Ian. When do you want to talk?" My mind was blown. If you've spoken to him you'll know, he's such a cool guy but he's very challenging to speak to. He's really accommodating but he's quite aggressive.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>He doesn't take a breathe, he doesn't pause or hesitate...</b></div><div>R: That was the coolest thing he said to me, he said "Just make sure you have a recorder because I talk lots and I talk fast". So when I knew we were playing DC, I - for a laugh - sent him an email, just to say we were playing. You never know, if he's around he might want to come to the show or something. He said he was going to be busy that night, but he might be able to get out later, but he was on the other side of town. Then he said "Failing that, let me know the next day and you can come over and I'll show you round Dischord". I was like "Fuuuuuuck!" Then we got the opportunity to come back here and play pretty much one of the biggest shows we could have played, which was playing with The Breeders when they did 'Last Splash'. They're one of our biggest influences, so we had to do that. We managed to fly back a a day early and play the show, which was amazing, but it meant we couldn't do the DC show. I emailed him back and thanked him for the offer, and said that hopefully we'd be back sometime soon and he said just to let him know.</div><div>P: It was weird emailing Ian MacKaye to say "Sorry we can't come to Dischord, we're playing with The Breeders". I was a bit gutted about not going to Dischord because I became obsessed with that kind of stuff because of Gray Matter... <br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="https://ytimg.googleusercontent.com/vi/IYlqN_49kW8/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/IYlqN_49kW8&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/IYlqN_49kW8&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b>In the Flip video?</b></div><div>P: That's exactly the reason I became infatuated with that label. It's really hard to find anything by that band online, or to buy their original releases. Dischord don't really press it any more because nobody really wants it. I was really excited about going to Dischord so I could ask Ian everything I wanted to know about Gray Matter. That was the first punk rock band I got into that wasn't from my older brother telling me about British punk, or Nirvana and stuff like that. I just watched that video over and over. To this day I think the soundtrack on that video is just ridiculous. A year after that I played my first gig, as a twelve year old at school, and we covered 'Burn No Bridges', the song in Boulala's part.</div><div>R: That's the thing. I'm a huge Minor Threat and Fugazi fan, but it's more the stuff he did <i>around</i> those bands that fascinates me.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>When I first heard Fugazi they were still active, and I was able to go and see them, but you must have heard so much stuff you'd have missed otherwise through skate videos.</b></div><div>P: I always find it intensely hilarious what the general public's consensus of what skateboarders listen to is. In reality, I wouldn't know who the Delgados were, or who Belle and Sebastian were, or Gray Matter and I wouldn't have listened to David Bowie if it wasn't for skateboard videos. And that's ridiculous! But as a young teenager, nobody in my family told me to listen to David Bowie. Skate videos are some of my favourite mixtapes.</div><div>R: I remember, another interview I did, with RM Hubbert. And he used to be really into skating. He's a huge Minutemen fan, and a Mike Watt fan, and he said that the reason he got into that was a Santa Cruz video. Streets On Fire. He said the soundtrack was pretty much all SST, so I went back and watched it and it was all Minutemen, Sonic Youth, Black Flag, fIREHOSE...<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/bal21rPEt2E?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Stuart Braithwaite from Mogwai used to always bang on about how he was a skateboarder.</b> <b>Posing in NME or whatever.</b> <b><a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/mogwai.html" target="_blank">He's also the worst person I've ever interviewed</a>.</b></div><div>P: Our friend Ben's in that band Fuck Buttons, and they were playing in Glasgow recently and we went down. Stuart's a big Fuck Buttons fan. I'd been skating all day and I had my board with me, and we're backstage drinking with Ben and Stuart's there, and he had these brand new fuckin' Rowleys on, and a Thrasher t-shirt and shit. He goes "Oh, do you skate? I skate." All this shit. I was just thinking "No you don't". After everybody cleared out I was skating there for about two hours while they were all drinking. It was in SWG3 and it's really smooth, and I was just doing stuff over the barrier from the stage - it's the perfect height to just fuck around in there. Stuart was just standing around watching and you could tell straight off the bat he doesn't have a fucking clue, it's all just an image thing for him. Maybe he can drop in or whatever, but you can instantly tell that if he skates he doesn't skate for the reason that he wants to be a skateboarder. He just wants to fulfill an image or something. It's quite sad. I'm not hating on Mogwai or Staurt Braithwaite but when it comes to bands attaching themselves to the whole skate thing it really pisses me off. I don't understand why anybody would want to adopt 'being a skateboarder' as a fashion thing.</div><div>R: You're instantly fake if you don't do it.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>It's like basing your image on what toothpaste you use.</b></div><div>J: Yeah! It's like if I went around dressed as a footballer. "Oh, do you play?" "Nah, I just like the stuff". Big socks with shinpads, sliding around the street in football boots.</div><div>P: Maybe Stuart does fucking skate, but I highly doubt it.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>I think he used to. As much as everybody used to. When Back To The Future came out or whatever.</b></div><div>R: Haha! He's maybe got a hoverboard. He can probably afford one.</div><div>P: You can tell. All the people I skate with, when they're walking around you wouldn't know they were skateboarders. Whereas all these people who don't skate, are definitely trying to look like they must be skateboarders. You can tell there are real people in music who do skate, because they're not hyping the fact that they do it. Like Odd Future, they're a prime fuckin' example of that. Some of those dudes in that crew are really good. Have you seen their Berrics edit thing?</div><div>R: It's maybe not quite the same because it's punk so maybe it's kind of expected, but Cerebral Ballzy and Trash Talk and stuff like that all skate.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>And Municipal Waste and all that. I think that comes from the whole Suicidal Tendencies thing.</b></div><div>R: Yeah. Those are a few bands who write songs about skateboarding, but it's because they skate.</div><div>P: There are so many bands right now that make me feel nauseous with the "We smoke weed, we surf, we do all that" stuff. It's like "No you don't, you live in Paisley. You've never seen a wave and you've probably only smoked council brown in your life". Everybody's banging on and writing songs about how their stoned, and skating all the time. Shut the fuck up. There's been an influx of bands like that, maybe because of Wavves. None of them skate. They don't say they do, but they've totally pushed this whole wave of bullshit. There are so many bands in Glasgow that just piss me off because they're so desperate to fulfill this stereotype. This surf-y, skate-y, smoking weed thing. When that becomes something you're aspiring to be, then you're fucked. It's not 'cool', it's a thing that you do.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/SL8zYk0mV2E?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Didn't you get noised up outside the pub when you were wearing a Thrasher top?</b></div><div>P: Here's the thing. The whole Glasgow skate community is fucking bizarre to me. I'm not from here, and moving from Tain to here, I was thinking "shit, there's going to be so many more skateboarders here. I am stoked". And I moved into a flat that was across the road from Kelvingrove so I was going there every day when I moved there. And the fucking static that was involved with going to that park if you're not part of that crew or from one of the areas those guys grew up in is really sickening. I thought that if you were a skateboarder, and somebody else is a skateboarder, then you instantly have something in common. Like Andy White, he is the fucking dude. That guy rips so much harder than all of those guys <i>and</i> if he sees you trying something that you're not getting he'll come over and take your board and show you how to do it. He's such an inspiration for the skate thing in Glasgow, but he obviously wouldn't think that. He's so rad, but all the rest of those dudes are so caught up in this almost gang mentality. And that sucks. But one night i was in Sleazy's, and we had just came back from SXSW where Thrasher had asked us to play. We were playing with Wavves, Bleached, Trash Talk, all this shit, at the mini ramp watching Ben Raybourn slay the ramp. He was just destroying that mini ramp when we were playing. And then I come back here and I'm wearing this hoody that I got from Phelps - he was just giving out shit to all the bands - and after we got a write-up in Thrasher, and these guys were all "What the fuck you wearing that hoody for? Fucking poser." I had my board, and I'd been skating all day, and those guys were all "Come on then, tre flip". I'm not going to fucking jump for them. I just assumed that as long as you're rolling you're of a similar mentality.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>It wouldn't have been Tom Shimmin that said that.</b></div><div>P: Nah, Shimmin's cool. I don't know him, but I've seen him rip.</div><div><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/Z00c8L8bRSw?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>You've got a label.</b></div></div><div>P: It's me and Josh, with some other friends. It basically started by accident. As long as I've been making music with friends I've always made shitty CDs and tapes of said music to give away at gigs. I hate how the majority of bands in the UK will record demos and demos and they'll never release anything until they have a proper studio recording released. We didn't have money to go to a studio or anything like that, so anything we recorded, we saw as a good representation of what we were doing at the time. I'd buy 20 or 30 cassette tapes and dub them all just so we had something to give away at our shows. By the time we had three different tape releases people were asking about it, and what label it was on and stuff. We didn't really have an answer, but I thought that if I was doing it for my band I could do it for my friends bands, and maybe group it all together so that this stuff has a home. I guess we were running a label without thinking about it, so we decided we should give it a name and keep doing it. But I haven't done it for a while. One band we released just got way too much hype, because we were doing so much, and people knew it was our label. Because we were getting attention it felt like anything we did got attention too. That wasn't right because those bands were great on their own merits, rather than me stamping an approval on something. I don't really want to talk about that.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Can you talk about who that band were?</b></div><div>P: They're called Honeyblood, and they're my ex-girlfriend's band. They recently got signed to Fat Cat. It's a load of bullshit basically. I put all my effort into releasing this thing for my girlfriend, then I got dumped and they got signed. It's a bit more complicated than that, but that's essentially how it looks in hindsight.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Can that go in?</b></div><div>P: Yeah, I don't give a fuck. It freaked me out because I was running a label on bedroom ethics, and I put this out because I loved someone, not because I thought they were going to be huge or anything. They could have done that on their own and I'd have had no attachment to it. we're going to release something properly now, we're going to do a 7" for Black Cop.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><iframe seamless="" src="http://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/album=3825678136/size=large/bgcol=ffffff/linkcol=0687f5/tracklist=false/artwork=small/transparent=true/" style="border: 0; height: 142px; width: 100%;"><a href="http://black-cop.bandcamp.com/album/black-cop">Black Cop by Black Cop</a></iframe> <br /><b>Why did you put tapes out before? it's an awkward medium.</b></div><div>P: It was all I could afford.</div><div>J: You could afford CDs as well, but they're fucking shit. Tape sounds nice.</div><div>P: As annoying as they are, when you actually find somewhere to play it, it sounds great. Tapes are second to vinyl, then CDs are somewhere way off. I'd take MP3 over CD. I like tapes because if people own it they must really like you, because they have to go out their way to listen to it. You know if they're buying it they're actually gonna listen to it.</div><div>J: I don't have a computer or anything, and for a while I only had this old ghetto blaster than my grandma gave me. That was the only means I had to listen to music so I'd go round charity shops and buy stuff up. I found some Sonic Youth singles once. I'd just listen to tapes all the time, until Sean fucked it. Tapes are something you can do yourself, in the house. Unless you have a fucking vinyl press in the house then your next best option is tape.</div><div>P: It's hard because you need patience. I couldn't afford to buy the tapes and have them dubbed. I could afford to buy them and - with my ex-girlfriend's release - sit and listen to those songs a hundred times each. You can't turn it down or it doesn't go on the tape. It's not just like burning something on your laptop.</div><div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/sO85rgfuaG8?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Phil, I know you lost your mum to cancer last year. She definitely seems to have inspired a lot of the music you do.</b></div><div>P: It's kind of more fucked up because - this sounds insane - but two days ago I found out that my dad isn't my dad. And I'm half Spanish. It's a really weird time to ask because this is even more important now than it was then. On the last day of our tour, in LA, my brother who lives there that I haven't seen for ten years disclosed this information to me because he felt like no-one else was ever gonna. He thought my mum was the only one that would ever tell me, but now he knew it was his job to tell me. I found out that the guy who I'd been believing was my dad for 23 years isn't. Obviously he still is, because he brought me up, but I don't really see eye to eye with the guy. I never have, and this is why, I guess. My mum was with this Spanish guy, and for the benefit of everyone I guess she decided it'd be a secret. There's an eleven year gap between me and my older brother, and I've had all of this shit my whole life. The first day I went to school, these kids were "Where are you from? You don't look like you're Scottish", and all this shit. There's been loads of gaps in my life that I've always just ignored, because I had no reason to believe that I wasn't related to my dad. We respect each other, but we have no similar interests, no involvement in each others' lives. It sounds like I'm making this up, but I found out yesterday that he now has cancer. So I found out that within two days of finding out he's not my dad.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Have you spoken to him about him not being your dad?</b></div><div>P: Not yet. I've decided not to. So now my relationship with my mum is even more intense. My whole life, she brought me up under the pretense that I was special to her, that I was different to my other brothers. I thought it was to try to raise my self-esteem because I was a really depressed teenager, but I know now in hindsight that it was because she was obsessed with Spanish culture, and wanted to move to Spain and all this shit. And now I know that she was calling me special and all this stuff because I was a Spanish kid that she'd had. My whole life I had a really extreme relationship with my mum, because she was the only person other than my oldest brother telling me to pursue anything I wanted to do as long as I didn't do it half-assed and as long as I didn't fuck around. To the point where she let me drop out of school to be in a band, even if it was a shit band, as long as I was serious and wanted to learn from that experience and apply it to my life and figure out what I wanted to do. She was always pretty full on with always pushing me to do what I wanted to do, and not do anything that was boring or stagnating. When she got ill the band was just starting to do pretty well. The day before she passed away we had a gig booked in London. It was the gig that Fat Cat came to and decided they wanted to sign us. She was literally dying, and then eventually I had a choice between going to her funeral and doing this gig. I went to the gig, but I somehow made it back to Inverness on a bus to go to the thing, but she wanted me to do my own thing to such a degree that she didn't give a fuck if I missed her funeral. Before her passing I had this urge, this compelling desire to do these things, but now it's the only thing I have. It feels more natural. If I didn't do anything I wanted to it'd be like I was lying to her and to myself. Her whole life she'd just tell me to fuck complacency, and fuck where you're from, and fuck getting caught up in what other people think or expect of you. Just do everything you want to do. I guess the effect of losing someone that close to you is just to embody their life's efforts in encouraging you to do something and not give up on it. To follow through on the things you say you're going to do. I know a <i>lot</i> of people who shit about "I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do that" and then months later they've not even lifted a finger to do anything. The positivity I got from my mum is just to encourage people I know to do things they want to. Don't be a dick, just do it. Otherwise you'll be sitting around when you're 60, if you're lucky to make it that far, saying "Why the fuck didn't I do that?" It's better to do something and fail than sit around on your ass getting old and boring and not try something you really care about. Live healthy and make sure you can pay your rent, even if only just.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/YLdPGl2Uiq0?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Plans for 2014?</b></div><div>P: I think we're going to tour, like three times as much as we did this year. The new album comes out in May. We're doing a full UK tour in February, then a European tour with We Are Scientists, who are fucking great guys. Then we're going back to America for more touring. We're doing a Highlands and Islands tour, Shetland, Orkney, those places.</div></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2014/02/paws.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-4829446298833000014Sun, 20 Oct 2013 11:31:00 +00002013-10-20T04:33:34.872-07:00Dave SweetappleEarthlessJ MascisTeepeeVolcomWitchWitch<b>It's pretty lazy to call any loud, bass-driven psychedelic rock 'Stoner Metal', but it happens all the time. Sometimes, I suppose the bands are happy with it. Weedeater and Sleep, you'd imagine, probably don't go out their way to distance themselves from the label. Queens of the Stone Age got called it for a while, but they didn't like it. Witch get called it quite a lot, just because they play that riff-heavy, bass-driven, propulsive, noisy rock music. They do tick a lot of the boxes that qualify a band as Stoner Metal, but there's so much more going on with them than that label would suggest. Formed in 2005 by <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/j-mascis.html" target="_blank">J Mascis</a> of Dinosaur Jr and his friend Dave Sweetapple, Witch have their roots as much in U.S. hardcore as they do in metal - two genres that don't often see eye to eye - and while these influences are definitely identifiable in their music, the sound they make is simultaneously incomparable to either. We spoke to Dave just after he returned to the States following a trip to Europe.</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-NQoYq6Wuhvs/UmO6pbD3LGI/AAAAAAAAAbE/IeZ1XsUwqEg/s1600/witch1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="298" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-NQoYq6Wuhvs/UmO6pbD3LGI/AAAAAAAAAbE/IeZ1XsUwqEg/s400/witch1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><b>How was Europe?</b><br />Europe was a lot of fun. I went along to tour manage part of the Earthless tour and launch the first round of decks the French and I doing on 1939, which included an Earthless board, but the plant never got them finished in time. The only item we had along with us was a 1939 collaboration t-shirt with Alan Forbes art on it. But yeah man, record shopping, good eats, and late night tourist shite made it all worth it.<br /><br /><div><b>Did you have a favourite town, or show?</b><br />I'd have to say London was my favourite town. I knew quite a few people that came out to the show and it was kinda like a party rather than a show where you pull into a town, play, pack up and leave. And of course, French and his wife Chrissie came out which was awesome. When he gets a few beers in him, he blossoms into a wonderful arsehole. He pretty much emptied the the backstage fridges of beer. Stood by me at the merch booth all night and yelled at people buying things. It was great fun, especially when the prospective buyer would ask for a deal on two or more items... He would swoop in and start berating them, "What the fuck do you think this is mate, a fucking bazaar in Marrakesh? You see the price. Fucking pay the man". I was laughing my ass off all night.<br /><br /><b></b></div><div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/BFNlWBtznBo?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div></div><div><br /><b>How did you meet French, and how did 1939 come about? I don't think too many people over here know much about that.</b><br />French and I met at a think-tank in Wyoming. I have no idea why we were there, except it was good food and beverage with a really nice outdoor pool. After a few more times of hanging out and having a mutual interest in skating and music, we decided to start this new company. Of course, he has been putting out boards for a long time through his Witchcraft Hardware brand, and I've been involved with releasing music for many years, so we thought... "Hey let's mix the two!" So we decided to start doing skateboard decks with band graphics on them, mostly in old school shapes. The first three decks were kind of a no-brainer... Witch, because I play in it, and the Earthless and Graveyard ones because it's like doing stuff for family. Coming up are boards for Doomriders and High On Fire, with a few more in the pipeline. It's not like this is a new concept, as there have been sick board designs in the 80s for bands like Metallica and Gang Green, The Big Boys and so on, but for me, those boards always meant something a little more than just a simple generic graphic. it was like wearing your favourite band on your t-shirt.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Pq-JojT_v8M/UmO8STEkp8I/AAAAAAAAAbU/Rk-Qo4y3_CQ/s1600/1939-trio.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Pq-JojT_v8M/UmO8STEkp8I/AAAAAAAAAbU/Rk-Qo4y3_CQ/s400/1939-trio.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><b>Do you like being called a Stoner band? I've always thought that term was kind of marginalising.</b><br />That's true. I have never liked that term. At first I was completely against it and to drive that point home, our label Tee Pee put some disclaimer in the press kit. It was sent around stating something to the effect of "Not to be pigeonholed in the Stoner rock category". But these days I don't really care. It's easier to call it that than say, "It sounds like Sabbath mixed with...".<br /><br /><div><b>What records made you want to form Witch, and make this music?</b></div><div>It wasn't so much listening to records that made us want to start Witch as it was a reaction to what was going on in our area <i>(southern Vermont/western Massachusetts)</i> in the mid 2000s. Mascis and I more or less came from the same musical background, classic hard rock into punk followed by hardcore. We'd been going to these shows in our area, more as a social thing than even for the music itself. There was a whole thing going on in these hill towns, which at the time hadn't yet been called Free Folk or Freak Folk or whatever you want to call it. There were tons of bands and they were playing this mellow, folky, falsetto vocal, clanging, folk music... Not that it was bad but it just had so little energy. One day, J and I were talking to Kyle <i>(Witch singer/guitarist)</i> who at the time was playing in an eight-piece folk band called Feathers, making fun of the 'scene', and J starts talking shit about how when we were his age, we listened to and played music that had balls. Kyle more or less dared us to start playing with him and after a few practices, we decided to record the first LP.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/xJK6XYleDo0?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Just after you formed Witch, Dinosaur Jr reformed. Were you worried that your drummer might end up being too busy with his old band?</b><br />No, I was psyched for him and the fact that his second wind swept in. It did mean not doing certain things at times but none of us had that 'do or die' mentality about the Witch 'making it'. We just pick and choose things that make sense these days.<br /><b><br /></b><b>Were you a fan of the Californian band Witch? Have you met those guys?</b><br /><div>No, truthfully we'd never heard of them before. same goes for the African band called Witch. 'Witch' is a tough thing to Google or whatever because it's such a basic, common word. Upon first looking into the name, nothing else had appeared relating to a band using that moniker.<br /><br /><b>Do you listen to any music that might surprise people? Did your listening habits change over the first couple of years of the band? It sounds like they might have.</b><br />I used to be a partner in a music distribution company, and we carried anywhere between 300 to 400 labels at any given time, so it meant exposure to a lot of different bands and a lot of different types of music. If anything I've reverted back to rudimentary shit from my childhood and followed some of that lineage to find new things to listen to. Before the punk/hardcore days, it was all classic rock from me. When I got out of the distro racket, i pretty much stopped listening to new music, mostly because it had been a job. Then I got back into enjoying music.<br /><br /><b>What do you think of the hardcore scene these days?</b><br /><div>I don't really follow the hardcore scene much these days. Like every genre, it has splintered so much that it's hard to keep track of what's out there. Like metal, it's become really watered down with tons of derivative bands. I'm not saying I don't still buy hardcore records, I'm just a lot more selective of what I do buy. Check out Obliterations. They're from Los Angeles and have that '82 style thing going on.<br /><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/O5-tyq3aIGg?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Did you know your Roadburn set was going to be released?</b></div></div><div>The German cassette?<br /><br /></div><div><b>Yeah.</b></div><div>Yes. Chris from the label asked about releasing a live Witch recording and I didn't really have much other than the Roadburn thing to give him. </div><br /><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><b>What appeals to you about cassettes? It's quite an impractical medium.</b><br /><div>Truthfully, nothing appeals to me about cassettes. I hate them as much as I hate CDs. I gave away almost everything I owned on cassette and CD, except for a few nostalgic things, like the first Bad Brains tape, and some other stuff form the early skate days... There's Raw Power- the Italian band- 'Live', the Toronto Hardcore '83 compilation, Direct Action, etc. These days I only have a basic stereo amp and a turntable at home. I got rid of the cassette and CD players.&nbsp;</div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><b><br />Witch isn't as full-time a project as it could be. Does that make it easier to make music, knowing everything's on your own terms?</b></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><div>Yes, the pressure isn't there to bang out a record every year and try to stay at the top of the heap. We do shows or whatever for fun and if we happen to record then cool, and if not, same thing.&nbsp;</div></div><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><b><br />Witch isn't your day-job, is it?</b></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><div>No, I do a bunch of stuff. I work for a couple of record labels and do the 1939 skate thing as well. Witch is just one of the bands I play with. I just got the test pressings for a new project I'm doing with a few friends. There is no name attached to it yet, but it's it's more doomy that than the others. A drummer friend and I recorded the basics riffs, sent it to California where another friend added layers of guitar, and then the whole thing was sent to Bergen in Norway where vocals and Moog parts were woven into it. It all came back to Vermont where it was mixed and that'll come out later this year.</div><div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/dc42dMAWLPI?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Can you tell us who's involved?</b><br />Sure, I play bass and the drummer is Terri Christopher from 27, who are on Relapse. The guitar was added by Tim Lehi. He's co-owner of Black Heart Tattoo in San Francsico and records solo stuff under the name Draugar. He's a sick artist as well. He did the last High On Fire album cover. The singer is Grutle, who is the frontman for the Norwegian black metal band The Enslaved.<br /><br /><b>Is that hard work? It sounds a lot more complicated than jamming with your friends in a studio.</b><br />No, it was quite easy and stress free actually, because you can do it on your own time without doing multiple takes as a band. The problem is that those freedoms eat time like nothing else. It took us months and months to end up with the recently finished masters, but it's just a project, so it's not a big deal.</div></div><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><br /><b>What's it like at Tee-Pee? They seem like a pretty good label.</b></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><div>Tee Pee has gone through many phases since I have been involved with it. It's a fine label with much recognition, but a book could be written about the label itself based on all the drama surrounding it.&nbsp;</div></div><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><br /><b>Have you got the nicest name in metal?</b></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><div>You know what they say about apples...<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/-2KKTSbzejs?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>How do you know the Earthless guys, and how did the Volcom split EP come about?</b></div></div><div><div>Getting to know the Earthless guys came from being signed to Tee Pee around the same time. Witch and Earthless did a few shows in Europe together around the time that we both played our first Roadburn sets. Then we did some east and west coast U.S. tours to follow. <i>(Earthless drummer and former pro skateboarder)</i> Mario Rubalcaba actually filled in as the Witch drummer on a tour or two when Dinosaur first started its reunion shows. Tee Pee used to be like a real family back then, with all the bands touring together and hanging out in each others towns. Bands like Witch, Earthless, Graveyard, Assemble head in Sunburst Sound, Annihilation Time... It was one big family. Things got a little divided in years to follow with newer bands being signed, but I have to say that from that original group of mid 2000s bands, we are all still very tight. I see the same kind of vibe starting these days with a bunch of newer bands, bands like The Shrine, Hot Lunch, Lecherous Gaze, Carousel and so on... With regards to the Volcom split, Kurt, who runs the music division over there, just asked us to do it and we said "Definitely".</div></div><div><b><br />What do you think of the new Black Sabbath album? And the new Black Flag line-up..?</b></div><div><div>I haven't heard the new Sabbath. I'm not sure why, but I haven't had the desire to even check it out. I did, however, buy the new Deep Purple and it fucking rules. I haven't paid much attention to the Black Flag drama. Two bands playing the same songs with different line ups. Pick your kings. &nbsp;</div></div><div dir="ltr"><div><div><div><div><div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><b>What are your musical plans for this year? A third Witch LP?</b></div></div></div></div></div></div></div>Hopefully, one of these days, we, Witch, will all be in the same room and bang out another record. If it doesn't happen, well... Once this U.S./Norwegian thing comes out, I'm planning on working on another one of those long distance recordings. Time is tough with that one though, as the singer plays in a touring metal band who are rarely home. Another band I started a while back is called Dusty Skull. We released a single earlier this year on Outer Battery Records. It features, me and the drummer from 27, and Graham from Witch and Lecherous Gaze, with Isaiah from Earthless on vocals. I really want to do a full length of that stuff. I guess I just need to book a ticket to Oakland and get it started.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">&nbsp;<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-IsGYkyg4eo4/UmO_bcUGyYI/AAAAAAAAAbo/dMCD3BTOzaU/s1600/witch2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="298" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-IsGYkyg4eo4/UmO_bcUGyYI/AAAAAAAAAbo/dMCD3BTOzaU/s400/witch2.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2013/10/witch.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-4103321798765251470Sun, 20 Oct 2013 11:04:00 +00002013-10-20T04:04:29.028-07:00Golden ArmsKeynote SpeakerRZASoul TempleU-GodWu-TangU-God<b>Despite having only one verse on the world-alteringly brilliant debut Wu-Tang Clan album (he was in jail for most of the recording), U-God quickly cemented himself as a solid member of the Staten Island nine-piece with four solo albums since 1999, tracks across all subsequent Wu-Tang albums and guest appearances on records by just about every one of his Wu-Tang associates. From his initial pre-Wu friendships with RZA, Ghostface and Cappadonna through to his son being shot, his incarceration, his own record label his and turbulent time as a Wu solo artist; U-God is planning to document his life in an autobiography. In the meantime, his new album, Keynote Speaker, is out now on Soul Temple Records.</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-dhIIG_4sReQ/UmO2sml-CxI/AAAAAAAAAa8/R9E20vFw3gY/s1600/U_God.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-dhIIG_4sReQ/UmO2sml-CxI/AAAAAAAAAa8/R9E20vFw3gY/s1600/U_God.jpg" /></a></div><br /><b>Do you ever visit Park Hills?</b><br />Nah, I don't visit the place man. For what? I used to go back there, try to show love to people, try to help people out, and they try to chop you up into a million pieces. There's no reason for me to go back there.<br /><br /><b>You records are pretty different from other Wu-Tang solo records. They each seem to reference different parts of the Wu that nobody else does.</b><br />I got my style of music. People either gonna like my style of music or they ain't gonna like my style of music. I'm trying to grow, and at the same time keep the original fans, you know what I'm saying? Every time I put out a record I figure out what people want more of from me. I'm also trying to give you a creative aspect, without being like anybody else. I don't know if people respect originality any more, but I'm still trying to keep that originality there as well. If people don't think it sounds like a Wu-Tang Clan album, well it does to me. It's just a 2013 type of Wu-Tang thing. People in the US are liking it, but some people don't like it. But hey. You can't please everybody.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/utjcxMRcwgw?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>When did you realise the tracks you had were turning into an album?</b><br />I do a lot of work, and I picked the best of my work, that meshed together. I do more than what a lot of folks do, and I picked the best of what I got. That's how I put it together. I can't tell you how to do it; you just gotta work, work, work, work, until you come to a complete body of work.<br /><br /><b>You've got Meth, Inspectah Deck, GZA and RZA on this album. Were those tracks you'd been working on together, or are they tracks for the album that you wanted those guys on?</b><br />When I get my tracks, when they give them to me, I know where I gotta go with them. I do what I do. When I'm with my group you're only gonna hear sixteen bars of me. You'll only hear a little bit of me on each song. I'm much bigger than that, so that's why I put out records, which are more of what I'm about. I think I did that with Keynote Speaker.<br /><br /><b>Your first album was quite late, in terms of Wu-Tang solo albums. What took you?</b><br />Because I wasn't getting attention! You got nine people in my group. I had to gather my own music, gather my own beats, and I put out my first record in 1998. My first record was a gold record. I don't know what you mean by "come out late", to me it was time to put out a record.<br /><b><br />When does something stop being hip-hop? Like the new Kanye album, it's pretty far from what hip-hop 'is'.</b><br />Music is music. It is what it is. You as the writer and me as the artist, your job is to write what I'm saying. My job is to entertain you. With my words, with my rhythm patterns. That's my job. Your job is to sit on the sideline and critique what I'm saying and also what I'm doing. At the same time, as a musician, we're dealing with sound here. And there's different levels of sound. As a person who is a musician, I understand what he was trying to do. We go through our experimental stages as musicians. We have to experiment, it's in us. Nobody wants the same fuckin' eggs and salmon every morning. No one wants to talk to the same people every day. You want to keep new energy coming. People want to push the envelope. It's the same with me, I'm gonna give you some Wu-sounding shit, but I'm also gonna take you somewhere else too. And you gotta come with me. But certain music does touch more people than others. And as a musician, that's what your dreams are, you're trying to touch as much people as you possibly can with your music. And sometimes we go out of bounds.<br /><b></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object width="320" height="266" class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="http://img.youtube.com/vi/rAV_yGNqODs/0.jpg"><param name="movie" value="http://youtube.googleapis.com/v/rAV_yGNqODs&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="http://youtube.googleapis.com/v/rAV_yGNqODs&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b>Your track 'Golden Arms' on the new record is more electronic. It's a step away from what you've done before.</b><br />The crazy thing about that is that a lot of people are gravitating to that track. Some people love that shit, and some people, it's not their cup of tea. As a musician, I have to make a whole body of work that everybody can absorb. You might not like track number fifteen, but <i>somebody else does</i>. My desire is to get fifteen tracks that y'all can relate to. And that's kind of a hard situation. Everybody's not gonna like the blockbuster movie that comes out, everybody didn't like Batman. You know what I'm saying? Everybody's picky. If you're making a salad you gotta put things in there that people are gonna like. People might not like croutons, but they in there. Like a body of work.<br /><b><br />But people are going to dig an electronic track, because it's on a U-God album anyway. Even if it doesn't sound like their idea of Wu.</b><br />I don't know how you compare Wu-Tang sounding records, because my record is Wu. Wu-Tang sounding records? I don't know what the hell you mean by that shit. But I know one thing for sure, you turn that record on and it's Wu-Tang right there. It's 2013. By the time I come back you might change your mind. Because people do that too. Saying something at the beginning, then when everybody start liking it, they got a change of heart all of a sudden. It is what it is. This is a Wu-Tang sounding record, it's just my version of it. You're gonna hear more music from me too. It ain't like it's just going to stop. Trust me. I'm gonna give you always good quality soundin' music. That's my job, man.<br /><br /><b>RZA is credited as being 'Executive Producer' of this record. What does that mean?</b><br />I don't know what you're talking about. Next question.<br /> <b><br />Tell me about the book you're writing then.</b><br />That's gonna be about my life story, because a lot of y'all don't even know me like that. I've been like the black sheep of the family, in the background of the fam. It's gonna be my life story. I have lived a very adventurous life. I was a very adventurous guy. It's gonna be a good ride. It's gonna be what it's gonna be<b>.</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/QOjrQolpxpc?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>What are you listening to right now?</b><br />I listen to everything. I listen to too much different types of music. That's why my music might sound a little more abstract than usual. I'm not biased, if it's good I'm gonna listen to it. I was listening to some Evelyn 'Champagne' King earlier. I might throw on Mr. Mister, I might throw on Journey, I might throw on Johnny Cash or Bob Dylan or Ray Charles. I'm all over the place.<br /><br /><b>What are you doing for the rest of the year?</b><br />We gotta finish this 20th Anniversary <i>(of the first Wu-Tang album)</i>. Get that crackin'. We got that crackin' before, then we had to go on tour. Then I got like a month home, vacation for a little while. Get some air, see the babies. Take care of fam. Then it's back to work. I ain't playin'. We gotta get this music done so we can entertain y'all and do what we do best.<br /><div class="yj6qo ajU"><div class="ajR" data-tooltip="Show trimmed content" id=":m7" role="button" tabindex="0"><img class="ajT" src="https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/images/cleardot.gif" /></div></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2013/10/u-god.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-7918025870790515480Sun, 20 Oct 2013 10:52:00 +00002013-10-20T03:52:16.609-07:00Drag CityFuzz WarGonerTy SegallTy Segall<b>Ty Seagll is the 26 year-old Californian garage rock troubadour channeling Black Sabbath and The Stooges into his own deluge of psyched-out musical visions. Whether solo or with one of the countless bands/collaborations he works with over numerous labels, the guy is adored by everyone from the indie rock underground and Pitchfork to prime-time US <span class="aBn" data-term="goog_1922057526" tabindex="0"><span class="aQJ">Saturday</span></span> night TV audiences. We got a chance to speak to Ty about where he's at right now, and if he's worried about becoming too hip. His new album, Sleeper, is out now on Drag City.</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-uTJ0yNZa6PI/UmOz3D5Ey8I/AAAAAAAAAas/vRklDweNaHE/s1600/TySegall_02_byDeneePetracek.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="208" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-uTJ0yNZa6PI/UmOz3D5Ey8I/AAAAAAAAAas/vRklDweNaHE/s320/TySegall_02_byDeneePetracek.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><b>You've just moved to LA from San Fransisco?</b><br />Yeah, I've been here four months now. The main difference is really that LA is bigger. You have to drive. I guess there's more space, I mean, we found a house here to live in. We wouldn't have been able to find a house in San Fransisco. It's cheaper too.<br /><b><br />Are you nearer the things you need to be near?</b><br />The only things I really need to be near are friends, family and the ocean. I don't need to be near any 'industry' place or anything.<br /><b><br />What's so good about sleeping?</b> <b>You don't strike me as somebody who spends much time sleeping.</b><br />Haha! The album's about dreams. And death. It's not actually about sleeping, it's about what comes after sleeping.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/oQwLneB9qkk?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><b>&nbsp;</b><br /><b>Have you seen the website of the Texas prison service, where they post up all the prisoners' last words? It's pretty fucked up.</b><br />That's such an intense piece of information. That's <i>crazy</i>. I can't believe they would put that up. Are the things that say pretty potent?<br /><b><br />Yeah. They all seem to say that God has forgiven them, and that death is just a stage of some journey.</b> <b>And they all apologise. Anyway, the songs on Sleeper are all pretty different to what you normally do. Is it an album you sat down and wrote or is it a collection of old songs?</b><br />They were all songs I wrote for the record. I started with a couple, then they all started coming out. It was a fast thing, like a month of writing and recording. I honestly was trying to write some loud rock n' roll stuff, and it just wasn't working for me. It just really didn't sound good. Those two songs came first, and I tried to write more loud stuff and it just wasn't working out. So I didn't really know what was going on. You kind of decide half way through a record where it's going to go, once five or six of the songs are done you know the vibe.<br /><br /><b>You've done Conan O'Brien and Letterman. Are you a rock star?</b><br />No, I don't think so. Haha!<br /><b><br />Well what's more significant? Prime-time TV appearances or people bootlegging your new record? The CD I got wouldn't even load into iTunes. I could only play it.<br /> </b>That's wild. Both are just as wild.<b> </b>That's pretty rad if people are trying to bootleg the record, because it means they're excited about it.<b> </b>That's probably cooler. In the moment, playing Letterman and Conan was pretty cool. That's an experience that you'll never forget, or have anything similar to. But they're both equally rad.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/2rnxRmDouF0?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Do you think there are people at your shows now who only come because they think you're hip?</b><br />There's definitely a lot more people coming out. People come up to me at shows and say "Yeah man, I'd never heard your records, I'd just heard your name", which is always a trip to me. It's like "Woah, that's pretty cool that you'd spend fifteen bucks to come out to a show of somebody you don't know!" Which is cool. It's always a trip to see different crowds, it's not just pals or rock n' rollers or punks or psyche-heads or record dudes any more. It's definitely a bunch of different kinds of people that come out to shows now. Which is awesome, which is the point.<br /><b><br />You played a load of classic rock covers at a show in New York quite recently, how did that go down?</b><br />I don't remember that show. What happened? Covers..? Oh yeah! I remember that show! It was at Death By Audio. We did two shows that night, the first one was just normal then the second one was a load of covers and a few really old songs of mine. They were stoked, it was a super-small place and people were just raging, crowd surfing. We did 'Paranoid' by Black Sabbath, a couple Redd Kross songs, a James Gang song. And AC/DC, 'Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap'.<br /><b><br />How much music do you make that doesn't get released? You've made more albums already than most people do in a lifetime.</b><br />A lot. There's a lot that I don't release. At least half has been thrown away over the years. With records, I'll always write 20-plus songs, and it'll end up being a twelve track record.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object width="320" height="266" class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="http://img.youtube.com/vi/NG9OR_zAva0/0.jpg"><param name="movie" value="http://youtube.googleapis.com/v/NG9OR_zAva0&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="http://youtube.googleapis.com/v/NG9OR_zAva0&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b>When you sit down to write a record, do you know what label's going to put it out?</b><br />It kind of depends. Almost all of my proper solo records have been for Drag City. And then a lot of other projects go to a lot of other places. There's still a few labels I've talked to that I kind of 'owe' a record to, because I want to do one with them because they're pals. Nowadays labels can really do a lot, with the internet and with distribution. There's not a ton of difference between labels, it's really just who you're working with and their style of pushing a record, or promoting a record, or how they're going to 'work' the record. Goner is more of a garage punk label, and Drag City is kind of an everything label. So there's some differences in that. Drag City has worldwide distribution, and Goner does too, but they're an import, so their records are more expensive in Europe. There isn't much difference, they both care a lot and put in a ton of effort. They're both radical labels to work with.<br /><br /><b>You've got a signature guitar pedal, how much input did you have in making that?</b><br />Matt from Death By Audio asked if I wanted to do a pedal, because I've gotten my pedal tweaked a bunch of times. I've known those guys for years now and I'm always sending my pedal in to get repaired or tweaked. I got this one Fuzz War that's my lucky Fuzz War. I've probably bought seven or eight of those over the years to give to people or as back-ups. The said they were doing a series of pedals and asked me, and I was like "Yes! Awesome!" and I came up with an idea. It's basically a volume boost with a delay reverb. I wanted something to volume boost over the Fuzz War. <i>(John)</i> Dwyer <i>(of the Oh Sees)</i>, his pedal is a pedal that they had already designed like two years ago, because he loved the Fuzz War but wanted something even gnarlier. The basically put two Fuzz Wars together and made a mega Fuzz War.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hZkHWRl-3OM/UmO1GLG8bEI/AAAAAAAAAa0/O4o6hGa6onw/s1600/dc479ph02.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="255" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hZkHWRl-3OM/UmO1GLG8bEI/AAAAAAAAAa0/O4o6hGa6onw/s320/dc479ph02.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><b>Rad! You're playing the last ever ATP festival, and ATP has increasingly become the domain of reformed legendary bands. Is there value in that, in reforming, playing an album and going away again?</b><br />It's definitely more difficult to pull off, but there's definitely value in it. If it's rad it's rad.<br /><b><br />But if it's not, it could ruin the whole thing.</b><br />Yeah! That's the chance you gotta take. The handful of reformed bands I've seen have been so good. I saw Pere Ubu do The Modern Dance in its entirety and it was one of the coolest things I've ever seen in my life.<br /><br /><b>Did you ever meet or play with Jay Reatard?</b><br />I did, yeah. I played a couple shows with him. Once was a Reatrads reunion and once was his solo band. The first time I saw him was his solo band, and it was amazing. It was right when Blood Visions had come out. It was in Oakland and there was only 150 people there. It was so cool. The second time, at the Reatards reunion, was definitely gnarly. He peed on his guitar player. It was pretty intense. But rad.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/Ek55T19hxmQ?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Did you ever skate?</b><br />I used to just cruise as a kid. I used it for transportation. Sidewalk surfing!<br /><b><br />What are you doing for the rest of the year?</b><br />I'm in this band Fuzz, and we got a record coming out on October 1st. We're going to Europe for about a week, then doing a US tour, then maybe back to Europe in the Spring to do a full tour. I'm just working on demos, and my band are going to start touring again. We haven't played in a really long time. We toured so much that we needed to chill out so we haven't been on tour for four or five months now. I was working on Sleeper when we were kinda slowing down! I think we're going to go back into the studio and do a sequel to Slaughterhouse, maybe. And I'm going to do another record. Just working on stuff, but it's cool to have some down time.<br /><b><br />Have you ever sneezed so hard that the doorbell rang?</b><br />Definitely not. http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2013/10/ty-segall.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-3713974039115460514Tue, 27 Aug 2013 12:56:00 +00002013-08-27T13:39:50.169-07:00Alan PartridgeAndy SmokeBlueprintCrayon SkateboardsJereme RogersJohn RattrayJon HornerPalacePredatory BirdRecord CollectorSidewalkThrasherJon Horner<b>You'll know Jon Horner's work already, if not from his Sleeping In The Dirt comic strip <a href="http://sidewalk.mpora.com/" target="_blank">Sidewalk</a> magazine then perhaps from his monthly strip in <a href="http://www.thrashermagazine.com/" target="_blank">Thrasher</a>, or even his comic in music-nerd bible <a href="http://recordcollectormag.com/" target="_blank">Record Collector</a>. It could be that you know his art from the boards, t-shirts and wheels of John Rattray's lifestyle/streetwear super-brand <a href="http://www.thepredatorybird.com/latest-regurgitation/" target="_blank">The Predatory Bird</a>. Howsoever you've been touched by Jon's wit, penmanship and imagination, you can be assured that everything he draws, he draws for fun - truly a skateboarder's approach to art. Without ever having to dabble in the dark art of self-promotion, Jon's cartoons and caricatures have found their way into magazines and skateboards here and across the Atlantic. With his profound knowledge and appreciation of skateboard history and Alan Partridge, we're lucky to have him - and since he's one of the most humble people you could meet, we were even luckier to get him to agree to this interview. As you'll see, we're very glad we did. You can find vast amounts more of his work <a href="https://sites.google.com/site/mrjonhorner/" target="_blank">here</a> and <a href="http://gentlemanlyconduct.blogspot.co.uk/" target="_blank">here</a>. </b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-8LlO9KBcObs/UhyM6mwNpdI/AAAAAAAAAX4/NEW-nRTbh2o/s1600/Jon+Horner+caricature.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-8LlO9KBcObs/UhyM6mwNpdI/AAAAAAAAAX4/NEW-nRTbh2o/s400/Jon+Horner+caricature.jpg" width="390" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Jon Horner by Andy Smoke</span><b> </b></div><br /><b>What's your art background? Did you study art, design, graphics..?</b><br /><div>I've got an art GCSE! That's it as far as 'formal training' goes though. My training was years spent copying things from the Beano and trying to draw the Thunderbirds.</div><div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b>When did you start skateboarding?</b></div></div><div>Around 2001ish I think. It was in the Tony Hawk boom. My brother skated and it looked like fun so I got a Hudson complete from JJB Sports for £20. The board had been shrink wrapped before the trucks were attached, and as I didn't know how to take the trucks off I spent hours trying to pick all the little bits of plastic out from around the bolts.</div><div><div><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-R46hizZXfOk/UhybnJpX27I/AAAAAAAAAZ4/sxfUakFgcho/s1600/Angry.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="147" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-R46hizZXfOk/UhybnJpX27I/AAAAAAAAAZ4/sxfUakFgcho/s400/Angry.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><b>Did one lead to the other?</b></div></div><div>Not really, but it definitely helped keep my interest. I'd spend longer looking at shop adverts than the photos in skate mags. Looking back I guess it was the tail end of the hand drawn cartoon graphics boom, World and Blind had been sold but Marc McKee was still doing incredible drawings for them. Flip had some incredible graphics then too, it probably helped that most of their team were basically cartoon characters.<br /><br /><div><div><b>Mark McKee kind of dropped out not long after that, what other skateboard graphic artists did you get into? It maybe wasn't the most obvious era to be inspired by... Did you start getting interested in older stuff? You seem to have a pretty vast appreciation of the history of it all.</b></div></div><div>Enjoi was just starting back then, I think Marc Johnson was doing the art, there were a lot of Saul Bass inspired graphic s that were great, the Heroin illustrator series were always amazing too. As far as particular artists go, at the time I had no idea who actually did anything! The internet was like a little broken down hutch compared to the vast rabbit hole it is now so there wasn't really a way that I knew of to find out who actually did anything, or really to find old board graphics. Document used to interview artists, so that was always interesting. I remember trying to copy one of the drawings in the Jamie Bridson interview.</div><div><div><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-xiNmZ54zMiE/UhyckUTHy1I/AAAAAAAAAaM/IEVLkS3Qq-w/s1600/welcome.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="198" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-xiNmZ54zMiE/UhyckUTHy1I/AAAAAAAAAaM/IEVLkS3Qq-w/s400/welcome.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><b>What's your day job?</b></div></div><div>I was hired to design a range of children's characters. Basically, my job was to invent the characters (how they look, what they're like, their world etc) and to work with other people on making toys, computer games, books and that sort of thing. The project is still relatively new, I've been working on it for about a year now and it's starting to come together. It's beginning to go from ideas on paper to actual physical things. Before that I worked at HMV.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Do the people at your work know about your other life as a skateboard illustrator?</b><br /><div><div>Haha, yeah! The day job's only part time and I work from home so as long as everything gets done it's all good!</div></div><div><div><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-GGJHlXfvvF4/UhyXU7vIO8I/AAAAAAAAAZA/uXl_Dp5C-ms/s1600/Where%27s+Penny.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-GGJHlXfvvF4/UhyXU7vIO8I/AAAAAAAAAZA/uXl_Dp5C-ms/s400/Where%27s+Penny.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">'Where's Penny'. <a href="http://gentlemanlyconduct.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/wheres-penny.html" target="_blank">Click</a> for bigger and more.</span><b><br /></b></div><br /><b>How long did the <a href="http://gentlemanlyconduct.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/wheres-penny.html" target="_blank">'Where's...'</a> <a href="http://gentlemanlyconduct.blogspot.co.uk/2011/08/wheres-chin.html" target="_blank">posters</a> take? I imagine you sitting up for nights on end surrounded by hundreds of magazines - was it like that?</b></div><div>They took forever! I don't really want to know exactly how long because it will probably just make me miserable. There were a few magazines but mostly it was just finding things online. I watched a lot of old videos on YouTube and logged an obscene amount of hours scrolling through the Chrome Ball Incident. That was the fun bit. Mostly they came together gradually over time but there was one all-nighter. When I did Where's Chin it was just one massive drawing on 9 sheets of A4 paper held together with sellotape so the whole thing was pretty precarious. I was moving flat and I wanted to be able to take it apart before I moved it so I stayed up all night surrounded by boxes listening to the Tina Fey audio book (which is excellent) and drawing.</div></div><div><div><br /></div><div><b>What medium do you work in?</b></div><div>The most basic one! I plan things in pencil on cheap A4 paper, go over them with drawing pens, rub out the pencil marks, scan them and colour them in with MS Paint.<br /><br /></div><div></div></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-j7fhEu5ABbw/UhyOzTw727I/AAAAAAAAAYE/zaABUZV3-tI/s1600/Factory.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="116" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-j7fhEu5ABbw/UhyOzTw727I/AAAAAAAAAYE/zaABUZV3-tI/s400/Factory.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Rejected Factory Sleeve Designs. <a href="http://bdsv.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Artistic%20Differences" target="_blank">Click</a> for bigger and more.</span></div><div><br /><b>What artists do you rate just now?</b></div><div>Andy Smoke, obviously. 'His Board Had No Pop' is one of my favourite things (it's at <a href="http://littleliedown.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">littleliedown.wordpress.com</a>). Everything Mike O'Shea does is amazing. There are loads of people! Phil Morgan, James Jarvis, Ryan Salter, Paul Parker, Pete Fowler, Rob Mathieson, Mr Gauky... I could probably go on for a while... &nbsp;</div></div><div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b>Would you be doing what you do now if it wasn't for Gilbert Shelton?</b></div><div>Ha, I was never that into Shelton, his art is always great though. When I was younger it was the Beano, Thunderbirds, Asterix and Wallace and Gromit then the Simpsons and later I discovered underground comics and got very into R Crumb, Peter Bagge, Joe Matt, Art Spiegelman, Harvey Kurtzman, guys like that. Basically, anyone who draws properly and writes funny stories. Life's too short to read turgid crap about feelings. Although, having said that, Chris Ware is incredible. A bit of melancholy is fine in his hands.</div></div><div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-dWEPuC8aKKw/UhyW3FiN8nI/AAAAAAAAAY4/YJpknCzNrXU/s1600/man+cat.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-dWEPuC8aKKw/UhyW3FiN8nI/AAAAAAAAAY4/YJpknCzNrXU/s400/man+cat.JPG" width="273" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">&nbsp;More Man Cat <a href="http://whoismancat.blogspot.co.uk/" target="_blank">here</a>.</span><b><br /></b></div><br /><b>Loads of boards get re-issued these days. Do you think that's because the graphics were better then? Rather than just logo boards...</b></div><div>Hmm. Maybe. I don't know if anyone will ever be as good as Sean Cliver, Marc McKee and Jim Phillips, they were the right guys in the right place at the right time. And it's true that some companies put out some awful rubbish these days (and not just logo boards), but there are still amazing new graphics coming out all the time. I think the reissue market is a lot more to do with nostalgia, there are a lot of men 'of a certain age' who have glowing memories of happy childhoods when skateboarding was all that they cared about. Now they have jobs and mortgages and responsibilities and reissued boards let them buy back a little piece of that glow and hang it on their wall. I totally get it, I bought a copy of the first Beano I ever owned from eBay! Also, it's probably pretty helpful financially for certain companies who's years of relevance are in the past.<br /><br /><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bUtNj_KZQEg/Uhyb9-uWQoI/AAAAAAAAAaA/X6B_olSl_t4/s1600/Alans.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bUtNj_KZQEg/Uhyb9-uWQoI/AAAAAAAAAaA/X6B_olSl_t4/s400/Alans.jpg" width="321" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Alan graphics.</span></div></div><div><div><br /><b>Magazines have always been a big part of the skateboard aesthetic. You must love magazines.</b></div><div>I'm such a sucker for actual physical things you can pick up and hold in your hands. Obviously it's pretty indisputable that in many ways the internet is 'a good thing' and as a method for distribution it's incredibly exciting. But as a medium for holding the written word, photographs or comic strips I don't think anything will ever be able to beat a piece of paper. Going back and flicking through old magazines is so evocative of a time and a place in your life, and that ability to go back and wallow a bit is something that's much more difficult online with the constant screaming emphasis for the newest, most excitingest shiniest thing. I really hope the days of the printed magazine aren't numbered. I never had much access to American magazines aside from a few issues here and there, but between Sidewalk and Document we've always been pretty well catered to over here.<br /><br /></div><div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-pLwRfsaRbfk/UhyREdzphgI/AAAAAAAAAYQ/hVoT3T81Y10/s1600/word-around-town.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-pLwRfsaRbfk/UhyREdzphgI/AAAAAAAAAYQ/hVoT3T81Y10/s640/word-around-town.jpg" width="460" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">&nbsp;A strip Jon did, featuring characters by Andy Smoke, and based upon the <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/bite-my-wire-your-top-selling.html" target="_blank">Bite My Wire interview with Jereme</a>.</span> <span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://littleliedown.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/word-around-town.jpg" target="_blank">Click</a> for full size.</span></div></div><div><div><br /></div><div><b>How did you come to work with Sidewalk, and how did you come to work with Thrasher and Record Collector?</b></div><div>Andy Horsley changed my life. After finishing uni there weren't really any 'proper' jobs around so I decided I had nothing to lose by just doing the thing I most wanted to do rather than something I thought would be more obviously useful in the quest to be employable. I'd tried being a journalist for a while, and it was fun but my heart wasn't really in it, although I did get to review the film 'Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus' for Time Out. That's a film about which dissertations should be written. It was also really hard to find anyone willing to pay real money, so I figured if I wasn't getting paid anyway I should be getting paid nothing to do what I really wanted to do.&nbsp;</div></div><div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-rCWJ0BvczRw/UhyYEUDi36I/AAAAAAAAAZI/Kf_IDZjL43I/s1600/big+push.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-rCWJ0BvczRw/UhyYEUDi36I/AAAAAAAAAZI/Kf_IDZjL43I/s400/big+push.jpg" width="277" /></a></div><br />What I really wanted to do was make comics, so I made one. At the time I was horrendously naive over-ambitious, so I planned out an eleven part epic called 'Gentlemanly Conduct' about a UK skate team on tour in 2002. It was vaguely inspired by the Vans 'No Home Comforts Tour' video, which is one of Andy Evans' many masterpieces. About six months after starting work on it issue one was finished and I sent it out to pretty much every magazine and skateboard company I could think of. Andy got back to me and started giving me bits and bobs to do and it went from there. There was a Big Push DVD cover, some stuff for the Buyer's Guide and the regular strip. The pitch was 'It's like Lost, but with the history of skateboarding'. As I result, I've been making it up as I go along. Getting work from Sidewalk was the first thing that really made me consider illustration as a thing that could potentially be a job, so I started looking for part time work to subsidise my hours spent drawing.&nbsp;</div><div>The Thrasher connection is all John's doing. He sends me a script, I send him a comic and he has all the dealings with them.&nbsp;</div><div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-QqFfVTsBZpE/UhyYjsoLgkI/AAAAAAAAAZQ/N1xQRsPzkII/s1600/BDSV+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-QqFfVTsBZpE/UhyYjsoLgkI/AAAAAAAAAZQ/N1xQRsPzkII/s400/BDSV+2.jpg" width="282" /></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">&nbsp;</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Bob Dylan Supervillian. Bigger and more <a href="http://bdsv.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Bob%20Dylan%20Supervillian" target="_blank">here</a></span>. </div><br />The Record Collector strip came from a comic I wrote with my brother called 'Bob Dylan Supervillain'. He's a massive music nerd and a musician himself (look for Syd R. Duke on YouTube) and we wrote this ridiculous strip about Dylan going electric with the help of Allen Ginsberg to fight Mr Tambourine Man. It was originally written with the Stool Pigeon in mind, they had a great comics section, but when we never heard back from them I sent it out to a few magazines just out of curiosity. Record Collector got back in touch saying they didn't have space for a full page comic strip every month, but asked us to pitch a few ideas for shorter strips. We did, they liked them and it's gone from there.</div><div><div><br /></div><div><b>Was the Crayon board pre-Predatory Bird? How did that come about? Did you skate the board yourself?</b></div><div>That was a direct result of the 'Where's Chin' poster. Dykie sent me an email and it was his idea to do something similar but with Korahn and his friends and famous Bristol spots. I was so stoked to be asked, Korahn is an amazing skater and Crayon have some serious heavy hitters doing graphics for them, so to even be considered was amazing. I didn't ever skate one myself, it was a bit wide for me! Having someone make something you've drawn into a skateboard is the best feeling.&nbsp;</div></div><div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-R-Y7NbeyU1Y/UhySEDBL7jI/AAAAAAAAAYY/KSSDT91L2ro/s1600/Crayon.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="265" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-R-Y7NbeyU1Y/UhySEDBL7jI/AAAAAAAAAYY/KSSDT91L2ro/s400/Crayon.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div></div><div><br /><b>Do you art types all hang out?</b></div><div>Andy and I have regular important high-level executive business meetings to discuss implementation strategies for Class IIB. These often take place at the kerb bit at Clapham skatepark, the crusty old banks at Royal Oak or in the pub.&nbsp;</div></div><div><b><br />You drew up a rad graphic for the new Blueprint. Do you think they should have ditched the spray hearts or do you reckon it's a legacy the new guys should keep up?</b><br /><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">I'm trying my best to get hired by Bizarroprint. No luck so far though. It's all a bit sad what's happened there, isn't it? Everything I know about exactly what happened comes from internet rumours and hearsay (Myleene loves industry gossip), but it seems like the brand's been in a bit of a tailspin for a little while due to various factors and now it's crashed down to earth in the Canadian tundra. I suppose it's a good thing that what Dan Magee and Paul Shier created was seen as worth saving, but this lumbering dreadlocked Frankenstein's monster is fast becoming a cruel and incontinent taunt to the past.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div></div></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HyD80IZt1f8/UhyU7xIIBUI/AAAAAAAAAYw/TjEjIeRsQMQ/s1600/Britprint.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HyD80IZt1f8/UhyU7xIIBUI/AAAAAAAAAYw/TjEjIeRsQMQ/s400/Britprint.jpg" width="137" /></a></div><br />In a way, maybe it's exciting that Britain can add a brand to the Blind/World legend of companies that were once great and are now a bit awful, but it must be pretty horrendous for Dan that they've not mixed up the graphics a bit. I mean, aside from the always incredible team, the first thing that Blueprint brings to mind is an aesthetic, and as far as I can tell, that was entirely deliberate and all Dan's doing. It must be pretty grim to see something you've worked so hard at and poured so much of your soul into being hacked up and shuffled about and slapped with a rasta colourway. From the graphics I've seen so far, and particularly that monstrosity of a cruiser board, it's like they've got all the pieces but they don't quite understand how they go together, why they would go together and why anyone would even want them to in the first place. But stick them together they do, with all the artistry of a drunk assembling an Ikea bookshelf.&nbsp;</div><div>But maybe it's a good thing. I think we can now all agree that Blueprint is no longer worthy of our attention, and perhaps that will give some other UK companies a bit of breathing space. Now that the Death Star has been blown up, the ewoks can all dance around a bit. If the decline of Blueprint was in any way responsible for the birth of the National and the existence of those RA Brown painting decks then it wasn't an entirely bad thing.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-A5XTmgPkA-E/UhyUzQBZ57I/AAAAAAAAAYk/zoEnsQ0DHC4/s1600/Phalace+VHS.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="250" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-A5XTmgPkA-E/UhyUzQBZ57I/AAAAAAAAAYk/zoEnsQ0DHC4/s400/Phalace+VHS.jpg" width="400" /></a></div></div><div><div><br /><b>Triangles in 2013: Post-post-modern, or tired and tedious?</b></div><div>I've got a theory about Palace and it's quite highfalutin (which is just a pretentious way of saying pretentious).</div></div><div>Plato had a theory that everything has a form. I tried explaining what this means in my own words but it wasn't working out so I'm going to do some route one philosophy student work and copy and paste from Encarta:</div><div><br /></div><div>"Forms are the essences of various objects: they are that without which a thing would not be the kind of thing it is. For example, there are countless tables in the world but the Form of tableness is at the core; it is the essence of all of them. A Form is an objective 'blueprint' of perfection."</div><div><br /></div><div>My theory is that Palace is incredibly close to the form of 'Palace skateboard company'. It seems like every single decision that they make is made on the basis of 'is that what we want to do?'. It sounds obvious, but it's pretty rare that you don't see something that's been second guessed in some way, whether it's to try and broaden its appeal and shift more units or to take the edges off an idiosyncratic idea that might be unpopular or controversial. It's especially rare in a company that's actually got popular and successful. There seems to be no great strategy in place at Palace other than, in the words of Nuit, "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law" and I think that's pretty admirable.&nbsp;</div><div>Having said all that, they're so tempting to make fun of! As far as I can tell, there are two main reasons for that. Firstly, they've got a really strong graphic identity (and rest assured I hate myself for using that phrase) which makes them easy to parody because it's very straightforward to make it clear that what you're doing is a Palace reference. And secondly, they're massively beloved of Sugar Ape readers who are nature's easiest and most deserving target.<br /><br /><h4 style="text-align: left;"><b><span style="color: red;">John Rattray bonus!</span> </b></h4><br /></div><div></div><div></div><div></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-a-EPuL8VUGY/UhyaJ-eY5iI/AAAAAAAAAZk/VSjxGd18gH0/s1600/PB.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-a-EPuL8VUGY/UhyaJ-eY5iI/AAAAAAAAAZk/VSjxGd18gH0/s1600/PB.png" /></a></div><br /><b>Hello <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/john-rattray.html" target="_blank">John</a>. Tell us about Jon.</b></div><div>Jon sent me, via Gmail, an illustration he did, fully finished and coloured, of Carl Weather's character Dillon, from Predator. The illustration depicted Dillon, screaming on his knees on the jungle floor, his arm, severed at the shoulder is being carried skyward, assault rifle still blasting, by a bold and ravenous gull.<br />The accompanying note said, "I've been very much enjoying the blog lately and in a moment of inspiration(?)&nbsp;I drew this. It's yours if you want it."<br />I did want it. This was the greatest piece of unsolicited mail I've ever received. So far it's a tee shirt.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/--eMZXadtWqY/UhyZlHS8K0I/AAAAAAAAAZc/WXT1dLlS-qE/s1600/Carl+t-shirt.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/--eMZXadtWqY/UhyZlHS8K0I/AAAAAAAAAZc/WXT1dLlS-qE/s400/Carl+t-shirt.jpg" width="291" /></a></div><br />Not long after that, on Instagram, he posted a picture of some graphic ideas with portraits and quotes from Bertrand Russell, Hunter S. Thompson, George Orwell and Kurt Vonnegut. I hit him up about the fact that these should be somehow manufactured. It's a project that remains unrealised - as lots do - but it showed that we were on the same page as far as heroes go.<br /><br />Anyway, a couple of weeks after that there was some news coverage of Dutch artist Bart Jansen's taxidermied cat helicopter. Jon posted a picture of that and I commented that "I just can't tell if I really do like that or not", I've still never double tapped that image. Jon replied, "I know what you mean. It's the expression on his face that sways it for me. Plus, he was named after one of the Wright brothers. And it would be really fun to take it to Trafalgar Square and blow some pigeons minds." He was selling me on the idea that although morbid, it was also awesome. I already knew morbid things can be awesome from growing up watching Evil Dead and listening to the drum check with Pete Sandoval skit. I told Jon that "it certainly adds a new dimension to the whole predatory bird thing". That's when he suggested, "The villain in The Predatory Bird comic would fly around in this".<br />"You make it and I'll sell it and this time next year we'll be millionaires!" I said. I've never been sure if he got the Only Fools and Horses reference there but he did agree that "Unimaginable riches surely beckon". <br />That's pretty much it. We've been collaborating on this comic story since then. We email and occasionally Skype to talk about it. It's been a lot of fun, Thrasher's been running it and hopefully we'll adapt it into a little stand alone thing at some point.<br /><br /></div><div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/iqqErFrQErY?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div></div><div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/iZ-ZFB2jCrI?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><br /><h4 style="text-align: left;"><b><span style="color: red;">Andy Smoke Bonus!</span> </b></h4><br /><b>Jon and his pal Andy Smoke are both managing directors of the UK's leading skateboard sticker company, Class IIB. Dismantling the snobbery of the skateboard industry one adhesive at a time, their limited edition collaborative cartoons can be admired (and purchased) here: <a href="http://class2b.bigcartel.com/" target="_blank">http://class2b.bigcartel.com/</a> You might have seen Andy's drawings illustrating our Bite My Wire music page, you might remember the board graphic he did for rooftop-preacher and self-confessed sexual superhero Jereme Rogers, or you might even have noticed the excellent drawing of Jon he knocked out to illustrate this very interview; so we asked Andy about his mate. Andy's drawings, photographs, mixes and other art can be found <a href="http://littleliedown.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">here</a>.</b></div><div></div><div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-vN-BH5yzWJU/UhyeQ2Rco6I/AAAAAAAAAaY/PBBjhDWtrRQ/s1600/nopop.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-vN-BH5yzWJU/UhyeQ2Rco6I/AAAAAAAAAaY/PBBjhDWtrRQ/s400/nopop.jpg" width="282" /></a></div><br /><b><b>How do you know Jon?</b></b><br />I met Jon through a mutual affection for Clockwork Orange banks and the Beano. I think Class 2B was born out of skating the bottom step of Southbank 7 one day. And anyway, having drawings printed up into stickers rules!<b><br /><b><br />Congratulations on getting a drawing on a Jereme Rogers board.</b></b><br />The Selfish graphic competition was funny - the other entrants were excellent. I'm still amazed the boards ever saw the light of day. J Cass may be manically insane, but he put one of my drawings on a board. Stoked!<b><br /><br /><b>How did you get into drawing?</b></b><br />Alex Moul was getting a lot of coverage in the first magazines I bought. Moul was on Deathbox then - a company that inspired not only with their skaters, but with their twisted cartoon graphics. New Deal and World were also making great graphics - I'm still stoked on Marc McKee and Sean Cliver's art. Needless to say, I was hooked.<b><br /><br /><b>And how do you go about it?</b></b><br />Most of my stuff starts with an idea in the bath, followed by a damp paper sketch. Sometimes drawings get completely re-worked in Photoshop; other times they get inked and coloured by hand. </div></div></div></div></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2013/08/jon-horner.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-8737008076437550608Mon, 05 Aug 2013 18:35:00 +00002013-08-15T00:50:18.632-07:00BonsHalf CousinHarry DeernessMat FowlerPlaying FieldsSpillage FeteMat Fowler and Spillage Fete Records<b>From his part as co-producer of pivotal UK skate video Playing Fields to his current role as a graphic designer with Playarea (sharing an office with legendary UK skate photographer Wig Worland, no less), and running a boutique independent record label with his friend Matt Hunt, it's fair to say Mat Fowler likes to keep himself busy. Since curating the first Blank Tape Spillage Fete event in 2006, the exhibitions have evolved into Spillage Fete Records, one of the most interesting labels - or communities - straddling the boundaries of art and music today, with artists/exhibitors/musicians all being encouraged to provide music, artwork and performance on their own terms. The DIY label releases beautifully experimental other-worldly music on vinyl, cassette and sometimes even CD, packaged in (and amongst) some very fine artwork; recently The Wire magazine described the label as "a delightful outpouring of outsider audiovisual art" while The Guardian declared it "A lo-fi celebration". Mat gave us his time to tell the story.<br />&nbsp;</b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/18n0JNUiyEA?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Mat Fowler's Playing Fields section, 1997</span></div><br /><b>What did you do after Playing Fields? It must have been such an all-consuming task, what did you do afterwards? Were there other projects you could move on to, or did you take it easy?</b><br /><div>Playing Fields was the last independent skate film I was involved in. Three years before that, myself, Mark Channer and Mike Manzoori made a film called Jello. All three of us had just left school and were studying at Amersham College on the outskirts of London, I was doing art while Mark and Mike were studying film and media. We hand duped around fifteen VHS copies and distributed them very carefully! I think Ben Powell might have the last copy left standing, my own nurtured mold in my cellar under the house! Jello documented some great footage, especially of a very young Tom Penny and Toby ShaulI. I continued skating up until my late twenties, at which point I became self-employed and starting creating design work under the name Playarea. Being self-employed allowed me to start focusing on my design work as well as playing music which had become a real passion since easing off skateboarding.<br /><br /><b>Did you feel you'd reached a bit of a peak in skateboard film-making with Playing Fields? I don't know where you could have gone from there anyway, it was quite 'defining'.</b><br />Looking back it definitely felt like a journey, a one-off project, at least for myself and I think for Ben, Mark and Frank also. My mum had passed away that same year and being involved in Playing Fields, spending time and forming bonds with Mark and Frank really helped me through a challenging time in my life. When it came to editing, I was interested in the final film, but the year spent making it was an incredible time where I had the privilege to meet some great people and get to know our small Island that much better. I met up with Frank recently to pass on the original master tape of Playing Fields - which had been in my dad's garage for over fifteen years - and it was so good to see him, he's still killing it on a skateboard!</div><div>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="344" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/0LmR2L_fhQw" width="459"></iframe><br /><div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">'Snowsteps', by Bons</span></div><br /><b>How far down the line did the idea for a label come along? Was it always your plan to take such time and care with the music you released - and its presentation - or was that a by-product of the artists you ended up working with?</b> <b>Tell us about it.</b><br />The 'Spillage Fete' record label was a result of a pipe dream both myself and musical collaborator Matt Hunt dreamt up called&nbsp;'The Blank Tape Spillage Fete'. I had becomes friends with Matt while we were both studying at Norwich Art School and when we eventually moved back to London we shared mix tapes and started recording music together under the moniker of Bons. Both myself and other Matt loved the warm, and sometimes unpredictable, sound quality of tape and the four-track was our own weapon of choice when it came to recording. So we came up with an idea for an sound/art exhibition based around our&nbsp;passion for the cassette.<br /><div>We invited musicians making art - and artists making music - to compile and create their own musical/sound material and record it onto a cassette tape,&nbsp;then asked them to produce the artwork to accompany their cassettes. The brief was left intentionally open, leaving the participants to explore all musical possibilities as well as creating artwork that could transcend the plastic cassette case. The varied and eclectic contributions formed the content of the first Blank Tape Spillage Fete exhibition at the Cecil Sharpe House in 2006,&nbsp;where visitors could listen to the cassettes at individual listening posts whilst also being able to peruse the artwork. A week long exhibition culminated in an evening of performances from selected participants. The project was a happy success for everyone involved and we ran a second exhibition with new contributors in 2009. These contributors included Luke Abbot, David Thomas Broughton, Sue Tompkins, Luke Fowler,&nbsp;Kirsten Ketsjer,&nbsp;Mike Lindsay of Tunng,&nbsp;Mac McCaughan from Superchunk, Merge and Half Cousin. After the two exhibitions it seemed a natural progression&nbsp;to release music&nbsp;by ourselves and people closely&nbsp;involved with the Blank Tape Spillage Fete projects. The name 'Spillage Fete' pays homage to the eclectic sounds of the fete, the spills of the tape, but also to emphasise a village community spirit of people making and doing.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-G5a8W6MNtDU/Uf9q3Ts9SZI/AAAAAAAAAWQ/G3fcAnfabd8/s1600/BTSF+%257C+Exhibition+Booklet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="281" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-G5a8W6MNtDU/Uf9q3Ts9SZI/AAAAAAAAAWQ/G3fcAnfabd8/s400/BTSF+%257C+Exhibition+Booklet.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Contributions from Luke Abbot &amp; Marcus Oakley for the Blank Tape Spillage Fete exhibitions.</span></div><br /><b>What about the other events you do?</b><br />Since the exhibitions we held in 2006 and 2009 we've also curated a number of evenings showcasing&nbsp;a line-up of artists who have released on the label or taken part in the exhibitions. Due to the often organic nature of these 'happenings', we label these gig nights as Spillage Fete 'Occasionals'. We've also released our first publication under the same name - 'Occasional' - which features artwork from label artists and a sampler CD.<br /><div><b><br />It's a beautiful artifact, yet very few people will see it. Would you consider doing bigger runs, or do you like that it's so limited?</b></div></div><div>I think for us the small runs are almost a necessity, cost being one reason and the other is actually getting the things&nbsp;we&nbsp;make into the wider world! We don't run the label through any distribution agents, we do it all ourselves, so our market is pretty niche,&nbsp;at least for now. Doing limited runs also allows us to hand customise releases which we could never do if the quantities were really high. The artifact is really important to us, there is so much 'stuff' in the world, that we hope our time, effort and goodwill puts something positive out there.<br /><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="344" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/eUoQwy38ZPg" width="459"></iframe></span> </div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Harry Deerness live recording</span></div><br /><b>Do you think skate videos today have such longevity, what with file sharing and so on? Would Playing Fields have ended up such an important part of UK skateboarding if it was released on iTunes? You obviously value the physical artifact, rather than things existing just on a hard drive.</b><br /><div><div><div>I never thought about that, interesting. Since Frank Stephens is re-releasing Playing Fields on behalf of all of us this year, I think he would have more to say on this topic, now having to reconsider the best options to get it out there in a digital age. Although a fan of physical artifacts, I think it would still have the same impact, mostly due to the collective and community driven feel of the film. It encompassed and documented the whole UK skate scene at that particular time and did so</div></div></div><div>with the pure blind faith, positivity and good will of everyone involved, void of money or sponsors. But yes, I am interested in the artifact and document, especially within music. It feels like archeology to me when rifling through record racks, and I think the artwork chosen to represent someone's music is equally significant and intriguing.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-om56ilBq5OA/Uf_pmHC8ihI/AAAAAAAAAWs/-CowuwqLM9w/s1600/BTSF+%7C+Exhibition+%7C+MMC.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-om56ilBq5OA/Uf_pmHC8ihI/AAAAAAAAAWs/-CowuwqLM9w/s400/BTSF+%7C+Exhibition+%7C+MMC.jpg" width="262" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">A Blank Tape Spillage Fete listening post</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>Could the aesthetic of modern skateboard videos ever match stuff like the old Powell videos? Or the first three Alien Workshop videos? Can that be replicated these days?</b></div></div>That's a hard one to say, I'm not up to date with modern skate videos but I should imagine that people could create films to rival those old classics. I think it's hard though, as skateboarding in those old Powell days was at such an early stage that those videos were introducing huge leaps in what was&nbsp;physically possible on a skateboard, as opposed to variations on existing tricks. Although I do think the accessibility of modern technology, like phones and internet combined with cine, Hi-8 and video could create some really interesting results. I'm interested in using 'generic' mediums in unique ways, there's a lot of potential and things seems to be really opening up.<span style="color: #310000; font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span></div></div></div><div></div><div><br /><b>Do you see parallels between self-producing a skateboard video and starting a DIY record label? To an extent both are based on hard work, little reward and trusting others to perform...</b><span style="color: #410000; font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /><span style="color: #cccccc;">The motivations are definitely similar, with Playing Fields and Spillage Fete, and </span></span><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">the emphasis was and always will be</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"> the process of creating and releasing something&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">you feel is both positive and authentic.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"> When we made Playing Fields we were unsponsored, signing on and using affordable low budget Hi8 cameras,&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">we saw it as an opportunity to create a complete scene video without any bias from the skateboard industry.&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">The limitations of both money and equipment&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">were often more a catalyst for creativity and ingenuity than a hindrance.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"> The label runs off not such a different philosophy, the rewards being the creative process, the journey involved and the relationships that follow. Both myself and Matt work full time and the label runs parallel to this, it's self funded and all sales go directly towards future releases. Most of the artists and musicians involved in Spillage Fete are friends or extended family</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"> met through the Blank Tape Spillage Fete </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">exhibitions we curated.&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">Kevin Cormack - aka Half Cousin - is a musician </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">we originally approached to take part in the BTSF projects, since then we have put out two wonderful releases by him, </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">one being a mini album under his Half Cousin moniker and a second titled Harry Deerness, a psychedelic celebration of decay.</span><b><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /><br />Why do you think so many skateboarders eventually move into creative industries?</span></b><span style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />Skateboarding really teaches you to pay attention to your surroundings,&nbsp;</span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">to really look and observe, </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">then from this to make creative marks. I feel this&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">is more relevant to street skateboarding than park or ramp skating; street skating was so much about exploration and curiosity,&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">questioning the landscape and architecture, making it submit or release some&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">untold secret that would otherwise be held in its everyday functionality. I remember first seeing a sequence in RAD magazine of Ged Wells doing&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">a wallride just off the flat, and I found it hard to believe. It made me rethink&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">the realms of possibility, and not just on a skateboard.</span></span><br /><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">&nbsp;</span><b><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></span><span style="color: #cccccc;"><b><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"></span></b><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: black;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/nT4eOcnLEj0" width="480"></iframe></span></span></span><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: black;"></span></span><b><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span></b></span><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"><b>&nbsp;</b></span></span></span><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"><b>Half cousin</b></span></span></span></div><br /><span style="color: #cccccc;"><b><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">You've mentioned enjoying the feel and sound of cassettes, but why do you think DIY and cassette-culture is enjoying such a comeback just now? Ultimately, it's a very impractical medium.</span></b><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />That's an interesting one, the cassette tape was the first format of music I bought when I was young and the only medium</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"> I've used in recording my own music</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">, so although I know&nbsp;</span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">they are considered a retro format, to me they feel very normal.</span></span> From my point of view the cassette and four-track is a cheap and tangible home recording method. I like the limitation of having only four tracks<span style="color: #410000; font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="color: #cccccc;">and no computer after effects, as it's really forced me to dig deeper and uncover new sounds, textures and processes. </span></span><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">And of course I love the natural warmth of sound that tape attracts. I think perhaps it's had a comeback as there are a whole generation of new music makers&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">who are new to analog recording </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">and are curious to explore, which is exciting as they&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">will have a totally different approach to using the medium having grown up</span></span> in a digital age.<span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"><b><br /> <br />Do you see this as something that's growing, developing out of just being a niche? A lot of people are deleting their facebook accounts, going back to old phones, that kind of thing. Do you think technology has gone as far as it needs to for now, and would you encourage people to embrace techniques used for decades rather than trying to keep up?</b></span><span style="color: #410000; font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="color: #410000; font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"></span><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">Wow, that's a good question, and it's something I think about a lot. I'm fortunate to have</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"> grown up in a time without the internet and computers.&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">I feel this places me in a position to observe</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"> and use the technology as a tool,&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">but not become 'plugged in'. I don't have internet or email on my mobile, </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">for me it's a distraction from engaging with the life around me and it just suits me better.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif;"> I think technology will always be pushing forward and it can be wonderful</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"> and useful for creating, but I value imagination and curiosity far more. Whether it's four-tracks or computers, either way I'm interested in scratching beneath the surface.</span></span> When I make music, it feels like lifting pebbles in rock pools, that same excitement, trepidation and discovery.<span style="color: #410000; font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"></span><br /><div style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-decoration: none;"><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-gSBY2dOQsco/Uf_rdpxQ8DI/AAAAAAAAAXE/iLH6ghQ4Qpk/s1600/SFR+%7C+Ocassional+Publications.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="252" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-gSBY2dOQsco/Uf_rdpxQ8DI/AAAAAAAAAXE/iLH6ghQ4Qpk/s400/SFR+%7C+Ocassional+Publications.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">'The Occasional', the Spillage Fete publication</span><b> </b></div><br /><b>Describe the music you put out on the label.</b></div><div><div><div></div><div>That's a tough one! Generally we're attracted to - and release - music that somehow fills the grey-areas between genres and styles. I've always loved the records that become definable by being almost unclassifiable, the ones you've never heard of, but are drawn to in the record racks by their curious covers. Both myself and Matt invited musicians to take part in the BTSF whose music we'd discovered through years of second hand record shopping. Some of these records being the unknown gems of our collections, prime examples being Half Cousin's Function Room and Position Normal's Goodly Time albums. We like the label to have that same diverse feel, to echo the eclectic and experimental nature of the exhibitions.<br /><br /><b>You discovered Half Cousin through second hand record shopping? That's really cool. Was it easy to get him involved in the BTSF stuff, and get two full length releases out of him?</b></div></div></div></div><div><div><div>My friend Matt first introduced me to Half Cousin, he would make me the most incredibly obscure mix tapes, and one featured a few tracks off the Function Room album. Following this, we both went to watch a Hood gig and Half Cousin played support and blew us away! After one of his gigs we passed him an invite to contribute music to the first BTSF exhibition and he kindly obliged with a track titled after fellow Orcadian George Mackay Brown. Since then we have become great friends, sharing a similar aesthetic and&nbsp;collaborating on musical projects. Myself and Kevin - Half Cousin - are collaborating on a project called Jam Money, which is recordings I've made to four-track then re-recorded onto Kevin's four-track for him to work with.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-K91peBfPLtI/Uf_vNyqPHQI/AAAAAAAAAXo/9MyoveNiv5E/s1600/SFR+%7C+Overall+Collage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-K91peBfPLtI/Uf_vNyqPHQI/AAAAAAAAAXo/9MyoveNiv5E/s640/SFR+%7C+Overall+Collage.jpg" width="451" /></a></div><span style="color: #310000; font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"><b><br /><span style="color: #cccccc;">How did Spillage Fete move from being an idea to a fully formed label/project/community? How did the first few months of it shape out?</span></b></span><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />In the words of my fellow cohort, Spillage Fete is a slow burner!</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"> We started it with a viewpoint to creating something that both ourselves and - hopefully -</span></span> other people would enjoy being involved in. We see it more as a community or vehicle<span style="color: #310000; font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="color: #cccccc;">for friends to create and release interesting music and art. So releases on the label generally only happen as and when they are</span></span><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"> fully realised and ready for the world, no deadlines or schedules.</span></span> One release that has been threatening to grace the record store shelves is Medallions by Bons; a collaborative album by myself, Matt and a sound artist called Benji Fox.</div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">Our original recordings made using four-track, keyboards, guitar, pedals, voice and percussion have been reappraised and removed from their analogue context,&nbsp;</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;">then reconstructed, destroyed, tampered with and ultimately redefined to create&nbsp;</span></span><span style="color: #310000; font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">a curious bedroom-pop-post-punk assemblage. All being well this should be completed and out by end summer, there is a taster on our site!</span><span style="background-color: #33cc00;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #33cc00;"><span style="background-color: #444444;"><span style="color: #cccccc;"><b> </b></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div><br /><b>Would you recommend building a project like Spillage Fete to the curious creative types out there?</b></div><div>Without a doubt; creative projects are a rewarding and healthy release, be it music, art, writing or anything else. And involving and engaging with other artists in a community based project really expands, colours and feeds you imagination.</div><div></div><div><div><div><br /><b>Outside of Spillage Fete stuff, what are you listening to just now?</b></div>Maher Shalah Hash Baz, Flaming tunes, Tall Dwarfs, Dustin Wong, The Books and Broadcast to name just a few.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4OUvUk5DzLQ/Uf_t_sRljKI/AAAAAAAAAXc/3EktsgVAXpk/s1600/SFR+&amp;+BTSF+logos.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="183" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4OUvUk5DzLQ/Uf_t_sRljKI/AAAAAAAAAXc/3EktsgVAXpk/s400/SFR+&amp;+BTSF+logos.jpg" width="400" /></a></div></div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: #310000; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">More to listen to at the</span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><b><span style="color: #310000;"> <a href="https://soundcloud.com/spillagefeterecords" target="_blank">Spillage Fete SoundCloud</a></span></b></span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://soundcloud.com/spillagefeterecords" target="_blank"> </a></span><br /><br /><span style="font-size: small;">Get all the info at <a href="http://spillagefeterecords.com/">spillagefeterecords.com</a></span></div></div></div></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2013/08/mat-fowler-and-spillage-fete-records.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-359647976787434653Thu, 04 Apr 2013 10:00:00 +00002013-04-05T06:53:46.563-07:00AtomiumBernard SumnerBureau BJohnny MarrKarl BartosKraftwerkMan MachineStockhausenKarl Bartos<b>Karl Bartos was a member of Kraftwerk during their most iconic, productive era. As the band's classically-trained percussionist an co-writer, he had a massive influence on the sound and direction of Kraftwerk, and ultimately - through records like <i>Trans-Europe Express</i>, <i>Man Machine</i> and <i>Computer World</i> - on the advancement of electronic music and how we know it today. Since leaving the group in 1990 because of the continuing slow creative process brought on by the band's perfectionist approach, Bartos went on to release a number of solo albums, work with Johnny Marr and Bernard Sumner in their band Electronic, produce music for others and even release the <i>Mini-Composer</i> iPhone app - which is a lot of fun. His latest album, <i>Off The Record</i>, draws from material he has gathered from the last 35 years of his life and is out now on <a href="http://www.bureau-b.com/" target="_blank">Bureau B</a>.</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-qn03kA7-I3g/UV1LAOcW_qI/AAAAAAAAAUs/JRyheKd7zk4/s1600/Karl+Batos+Amonihat1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-qn03kA7-I3g/UV1LAOcW_qI/AAAAAAAAAUs/JRyheKd7zk4/s400/Karl+Batos+Amonihat1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Atomium-headed Karl illustration by <a href="http://littleliedown.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Andy Smoke</a>.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b>So I understand that this new album is made up of pieces of a 'musical scrapbook' you've been building up over the years. If that's the case, does the record reflect more on where you are, musically, now or at the time you had the idea?</b><br />Hopefully the result is the best of both worlds! When my label approached me, they said "Hey Karl, haven't you got any old tapes in the attic?" I refused, but they kept asking me and asking me, and they just wanted to put these old tapes from the attic out. Finally I got convinced by the idea, and I transferred all my old tapes from my archive into the computer. When I saw all the dates, 1977, 1978, and so on, it looked like a kind of 'acoustic diary'. It wasn't meant to be an acoustic diary but it became an acoustic diary by seeing all the data. Once I transferred it into the computer it was easy for me to just put bits together, and I did what we call recontextualisation. It's easy to recontextualise material on the computer! I took these bits, these jottings, from here and from there, and they were not real compositions, but just jottings. Some of these scribbles I took into a place called Kling Klang studios, and they became rather famous. Some of them, I didn't. Some of them I took there and they seemed to be a misfit, or they just didn't belong to the current record. Unfortunately, we made so few records at the time, in the 70s and 80s! So I ended up with this encounter. Karl Bartos that I am now, with this youngster, this whippersnapper from the 70s and the 80s. So I could combine this naivety which a 20-something guy has, with my experience now, which led to this record that is in our hands today.<br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /><b></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/byYl3erK3cc?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div style="text-align: left;"></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /><b>Was it easy to recontextualise the old stuff with modern technology? Bearing in mind you weren't writing all that stuff with modern technology.</b><br />Exactly. This is as developed as we can be, having a computer to splice these things together. In the early days you couldn't make an archive, and technology wasn't as accessible as it is nowadays, so it was a great help. It's a complete mash up actually, of the technologies from the 70s and 80s, and nowadays technology. So again, the best of both worlds. This record couldn't have been done in the 70s or 80s.<br /><br /><b>When you were in Kraftwerk, you were having to develop the technology to make music yourselves. Now anybody can make music on their computer. Do you think technology has affected people's creativity?</b><br />Yes, of course. The medium is always responsible for the content. It won't affect me, because I did my piano lessons when I was young, I played in an orchestra and I played guitar. So I use technology as a tool. But certainly, if you take your first steps in making music when you open up a computer and load some music software, then of course it will affect the content you are producing. There's no way around that. But I am just listening to music in my head before I compose it, and I'm not depending on software or anything else.<br /><br /><b>Kraftwerk already existed when you joined. Were you invited in as a writer, or were you initially just asked to join as a musician?</b><br />It was 1975 when Florian called my professor, and he was just asking for a classically trained drummer. So I got the job as a studio musician when I started, then I ended up on this famous US tour in 1975. It was a really good chance for me to make myself acquainted with the American music culture, and it really changed my life. That was the Autobahn tour, then I played the drums on Radioactivity and Trans-Europe Express. I already had some input then but unfortunately my name is not on the records. By the time we did Man Machine I got invited to be an official co-composer, and I found it very natural. I had already been round for two records, and had my input on them, and finally I got the credit on Man Machine. So it was a natural process.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /><object width="320" height="266" class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="http://img.youtube.com/vi/pbCH9BO_hHM/0.jpg"><param name="movie" value="http://youtube.googleapis.com/v/pbCH9BO_hHM&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="http://youtube.googleapis.com/v/pbCH9BO_hHM&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /><b>What electronic music do you enjoy personally?</b></div><div style="text-align: left;">Stockhausen<b>. </b>Pierre Schaeffer from Paris, he invented what we know now as Musique Concrète. Pierre Henry... I must confess I don't listen to new music any more, or on the internet. It's just so confusing.<br /><br /><b>Do you think that because music is so easy to make and release now, that there's too much of it?</b><br />There can't be too much music in this world. We badly need music, and we badly need people to play music. This is very important for our soul. Music comforts us. It's really good for every one of us to sit down and play guitar or play a laptop, or sing in the shower. Every one of us needs music. I found out I can only relate to music which comes from people I know personally. Somehow you have to make a distinction, because there's only 24 hours in a day and I can't listen to all of it.<br /><br /><b>Do you think it's because you know where these people are coming from already? Do you think that if you listened to music made by somebody you didn't know personally that you wouldn't know the point they were making, musically?</b><br />It was much easier when I was young. We had <i>(pirate station)</i> Radio Luxembourg, and there was just the charts, and in the 60s and 70s you were sure that the first ten numbers were quite good. Although once in a while there was Englebert Humperdinck playing at number one. But normally, in the 60s, you would find people like Jimi Hendrix at number one, or the Beatles, or the Kinks. It was really good music and the message in the music was fantastic, and in some ways it changed politics and it changed society. If you look into the internet, this music is still around! It doesn't disappear. There's music that was created in the 90s that has disappeared. You can't find it any more. So it was much easier in the early days of pop music. I don't want to know about the latest Lady Gaga record anymore, it's not worth it. It's worth it if one of my students, or a friend, sends me music. We can have a conversation about it, and I don't get confused by two million songs on the internet. It's too much.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/H6XVJRk3cHM?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /><b>What's your average day?</b><br />I get up and I go out. I live on the outskirts of Hamburg, very close to the river. So I go to the river and exercise for an hour and a half. I go with the dog. Hamburg, as you know, has a big harbour so if I'm lucky I might see the Queen Mary II coming in. I'm not lucky all the time. By midday I'm ready to go to the studio. I need the contemplation and routine to regain motivation.<br /><br /><b>Do you listen to your own music?</b><br />No, you can't. You need distance. I can't listen to my new record because I'm close to burn out now.<br /><br /><b>Is that because it's a solo record? Would it be different if it was a record you'd made with other people?</b><br />Even when I worked with Johnny <i>(Marr)</i> and Bernard <i>(Sumner)</i>, you put all your life into the record, and then it's finished. I'll tell you another secret. When you start a record, whether it's a solo record or it's a group attempt, the first thing you want to do is to change the world. But when you're finishing it, you just hope you're getting away with it.<br /><br /><b>How did you come to work with Johnny and Bernard?</b><br />Bernard listened to my first solo record, and must have though "Oh, this guy's solo, maybe we can get him to do some electronic percussion on our tracks". We ended up co-composing a lot of the music so I ended up writing a lot of songs with Bernard and Johnny. We're still friends, it's amazing.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/jGyc-sWMpsM?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /><b>You mentioned earlier the Beatles, the Kinks and Jimi Hendrix. If that was what you were listening to when you were studying classical music, what made you want to play electronic music?</b><br />After my initialisation with music, I learned all the famous songs from the 60s era. You had to. They were so beautiful, and it was like magnetism. I learned how to play guitar, and I learned pop music, and finally I understood pop music really well, by analysing it and playing it. Copycat style, in cover bands. It's always the same approach. You copy it, then you compose songs 'in the manner of'. If you're really good, you find your own identity and you come up with something new. Keith Richards used to say. "It's funny, if I play an old blues song, it's funny to see how it turns into a Keith Richards song". That's the whole story of creativity. I was quite young, but I wanted this to be the thread of my life, I wanted to become a musician. Coming from a German background, I thought I had to study it at university. So I went there, and after I discovered Chuck Berry I discovered Bach and Beethoven and I ended up becoming a percussion player. By studying percussion in the 60s and 70s you make yourself acquainted with Stockhausen and John Cage, and you learn about serial music, minimalistic music and electronic music. So I thought "OK, here is the guy who influenced Sgt. Pepper, this is Karlheinz Stockhausen, he lives very close to us!" Dusseldorf and Cologne are very close. And then I ended up in Kraftwerk, where I got it all together. We had the pop music approach, and we had the German electronics, all at once.<br /><br /><b>With all your musical training, and your interests, did you find it easy to make an album like Man Machine?</b><br /><i>(Long pause)</i> Yes. Normally, if you're following the lectures of Karlheinz Stockhausen, you would exclude pop music. But this was my first step, my initialisation, so it was very easy to have those different ingredients and bring them all together, and on top of that to add some funky rhythms by James Brown. If you mix them all up in a perfect cultural mash up, and I had this feeling we were going to generate something quite authentic.<br /><br /><b>You didn't really have anybody to base your music on, and that's never going to happen to somebody again.</b><br />We had to be authentic. I like I Am The Walrus, but it's not me. It belongs to another heritage. I can admire it, and I can praise it, but I can never be it.</div><div style="text-align: left;"></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b>What are your plans for the rest of the year?</b><br />We have a screening in London, at the Rough Trade record shop, and I'm doing a lot of promotion all over Europe and America. Then I'm going to prepare my live show, which is an audio-visual show. I'm really into the convergence of image and sound.<br /><br /><b>What do you think of Ralf touring as Kraftwerk?</b><br />My lips are sealed. If Sir Paul McCartney plays, it's a Sir Paul McCartney concert. It's really great how he does that.<br /><b><br />Yeah. He doesn't call himself 'The Beatles'. Anything else before we finish up?</b><br />I wish I had learned to jump on this little machine, the skateboard. I wish I could, but I am just not able to. I would break a leg. I'm not good at balancing!</div><div style="text-align: left;"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">More Karl Bartos info <a href="http://www.bureau-b.com/karlbartos.php" target="_blank">here</a>. More great Andy Smoke drawings to be found <a href="http://littleliedown.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">here</a>.</span></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2013/04/karl-bartos.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-1696600095296213902Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:58:00 +00002013-03-14T01:58:38.265-07:00Alien WorkshopDinosaur JrGG AllinJ MascisJagjaguwarLou BarlowMergeNike SBJ Mascis<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><b>J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr. isn't rude, and he isn't necessarily very shy. It's more that he only speaks when he needs to - when he does it's a semi-whisper - he doesn't like speaking about himself and he rarely gives interviews. Having known this since I first became aware of the band in my early teens, I was pretty excited when I was granted an interview with him just before Dinosaur Jr.'s recent Glasgow show.<br /> I meet J as he lifts an adidas shoebox from a bag bearing the name of a popular high street footwear/fashionwear chain. He begins lacing up the black-and-purple <i>Spezial</i> trainers when I notice the bright green tracksuit top he's wearing is also by the German footwear manufacturer. I learn that yes, he is able to call a friend at adidas and have the clothes he wants sent to him, but that - of course - this isn't a favour he can reply upon whilst touring around the world. There was something reassuring about knowing that J likes to buy new trainers when he's in a new city, like it made me realise how ordinary J is, despite his status as some mysterious underground legend. With his new trainers laced and on his feet, J moves on to eating a bag of fruit and a low-fat yoghurt, and I start recording.</b><br /><br /> <b></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-G4BnNLAIUrc/UUDsd-khstI/AAAAAAAAAUY/v6enBVA2Vls/s1600/Dinosaur+Jr+2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="322" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-G4BnNLAIUrc/UUDsd-khstI/AAAAAAAAAUY/v6enBVA2Vls/s400/Dinosaur+Jr+2.JPG" width="400" /></a></div><br /><b>Dinosaur Jr. was my first show, when I was a little kid. Chances are that tonight will be somebody's first show too. Do you think there's a significance to being the first band a person sees live?</b><br />I saw Ian Hunter the other day, in a radio station. I told him he was the first show I saw. He was psyched. Jane Fonda was also at the radio station. It was this serious radio station in New York. All this stuff was going on there, people wandering around. But it's awesome because a lot of original fans probably don't go to shows any more.<br /> <b>&nbsp;</b><br /><b>Have you ever thought that an album you make could be the first album somebody owns?</b><br /> No. I don't think about it like that. I don't know why. I always think people hear, like, The Beatles or something first.<br /><br /><b>Still?</b><br />Sort of! Hehe!<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/FpsGcnLEZbk?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Your new record is out on Jagjaguwar, and they've also re-issued <i>Bug</i> and <i>You're Living All Over Me</i>. Was that a deal-breaker?</b><br /> We worked with them on the last record, <i>Farm</i>.<br /><br /><b>Oh. That wasn't out on Jagjaguwar in the UK.</b><br />The CDs are out on Merge, so that's weird too. Like, at the the time we re-issued <i>You're Living All Over Me</i> and <i>Bug</i> they didn't want to do vinyl, and I did vinyl on my own. And now, a few years later, vinyl's coming back so I licensed it to Jagjaguwar. I think. Maybe Merge wasn't happy about that. It's weird that they have the CDs and Jagjaguwar has the vinyl.<br /> <br /><b>Do you think the death of high street music stores will affect the concept of albums?</b><br />Probably not. Not for me. I still think of albums, I still think that way. I'm not sure. I guess it's different in the States. We've got a lot of independent record shops. There's still a lot of record stores in the States. That's weirder. But HMV didn't sell much stuff <i>(music)</i>, did it? Somebody said that you couldn't even buy our last album in HMV.<br /> <br /><b>They'd probably have had one copy in each shop. Just one of everything.</b> <b>It was still where the man in the street would go to buy his music, but that's been taken away now.</b><br />Yeah, that's pretty strange. I guess it's records that are more the focus in the States. CDs seem to be dying out, but there are still record shops. More records are being made.<b><br /></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-w-4Fojing58/UUDtT57COJI/AAAAAAAAAUc/h3cKjDVfbuc/s1600/Dinosaur+Jr+1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-w-4Fojing58/UUDtT57COJI/AAAAAAAAAUc/h3cKjDVfbuc/s320/Dinosaur+Jr+1.JPG" width="258" /></a></div><br /><b>How did your relationship with Alien Workshop come about? I know you've been friends with Neil Blender for a long time...</b><br />Yeah, I was friends with Neil Blender, and he went with these guys to form Alien Workshop and move to Ohio, but he didn't want to be a partner in it. I don't know why, but he still moved there with them, and was involved, but he was always the outsider. He worked there and stuff, but he wasn't a partner in it, and he just kinda left. It's strange. He didn't want to commit.<br /> <br /><b>And now it's Rob Dyrdek who's in charge.</b><br />Yeah. I remember when we played down there when they first started, and he was so young. He was a skater there and he came to our show with those guys.<br /><br /> <b>Alien still put out Dinosaur Jr. boards, don't they? Sometimes?</b><br />The last board of ours they put out had pictures on my new Squire guitar on it. That was pretty cool<b>.</b><br /><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/QbjDFzEQOw8?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>You put out a live album, <i>Chocomel Daze</i>, recently. It's a show from 1987 - why did you put out a show from then?</b><br /> I think Merge wanted to do something from the <i>You're Living All Over Me</i> period, because we did this anniversary show. That was pretty cool. We had a lot of people guest-play with us. Johnny Marr...<br /><br /><b>Yeah, Johnny Marr - you played <i>How Soon Is Now</i>, one of his songs. How did that happen?</b><br /> I asked him if he wanted to play, and then later asked him what song he wanted to play, and he mentioned that because he knew I had covered it before. And then we played <i>The Wagon</i>.<br /><b><br />Which has got a David Bowie cover on the B-side. What's your favourite cover you've done?</b><br /> That we've recorded? I guess <i>Just Like Heaven</i> came out the best, maybe. We still play that. I also like this Richard Thopmson cover we did. That's maybe my favourite one. It was for a Richard Thompson tribute album. It's called <i>I Misunderstood</i>, and he said he liked it the best on the album. I liked it the best on that album too, because I really wanted to do that song. I'd heard him play it live, acoustic, and then when the record came out it sounded a lot different. It was a lot softer and wimpier sounding than when he played acoustic, so I kinda a more of a heavier version, like the first time I heard it.<br /> <br /><b>To whom did the cuddly cow on the sleeves and t-shirts belong?</b><br />Me. I bought it, and that gorilla, from the same company. I can't find the cow any more, but I still have the gorilla.<br /><br /><b>How does what you listened to when you started out compare with what you listen to now?</b><br /> I mean, it's a lot of the same stuff but then you're always discovering different music that you like. There was a Love album that was unreleased that just came out, I've been listening to that. That was pretty cool. I've been actually listening to Belle and Sebastian a lot lately, speaking of Glasgow! I don't know why. Hehe!<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/FJLOr8S2d2E?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /> <b>There's a Dinosaur Jr. Nike SB shoe. How did that come about?</b><br />It was awesome. I did two different shoes. They were pretty cool. I liked the silver ones. Ace Frehley was my inspiration, I tried to make Ace Frehley boots. I just designed some other kind of shoes recently, for this company Keep. Those come out pretty cool. They're kinda suede, sorta like desert boots. They're fake suede anyway. It's an LA company. I don't think they're quite out yet. The girl's boyfriend is a skateboarder, they're kinda in the skateboard scene in LA.<br /> <b><br />You recently played <i>Bug</i> live, from start to finish. Why that album? Is it your favourite?</b><br />No, that's my least favourite. <i>You're Living All Over Me</i> is my favourite. We've done that also. We just got an offer from ATP to play that album, they like that album. We decided to do some other shows if we were going to bother to learn the whole album.<br /> <br /><b>Are you sick of playing Freak Scene?</b><br />No, it was just a bad time when we made it, so it reminds me of that. But playing it definitely helped me like it better, when we learned all these songs we haven't played. It was pretty cool. Henry Rollins interviewed us on stage before we played, and that was pretty funny too.<br /> <br /><b>Are you friends with Henry anyway?</b><br />Yeah. I knew he would talk if we didn't.<b><br /><br />Did you and Lou listen to each other's music when he stopped being in Dinosaur?<br /> </b>Not much. I would go see Sebadoh, but I didn't really listen to his records. I don't think he would listen to my stuff. He wouldn't go to any of my shows.<br /><br /><b>You played in GG Allin's band in the 1980s. Did he ever have 'off' nights?</b><br />I don't think he really has off nights. He's pretty over the top<b>, </b>but only on stage, like, off stage he's pretty normal.<b> </b>He'd take Ex-Lax, so he would be shitting, and I don't know what kind of drugs he was taking.<b> </b>I remember the whole crowd would be at the back wall of the club, no-one wanted to get near the stage. They ran to the back.<b><br /> <br />Was he a nice guy?</b><br />Oh yeah. He was cool. He just really transformed on stage, he got really prepared.<br /><b></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object width="320" height="266" class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="http://img.youtube.com/vi/apAKU_sXQJQ/default.jpg?h=90&w=120&sigh=__Jmlvoru3znFjKD1ZlYEGL2pSPyI="><param name="movie" value="http://youtube.googleapis.com/v/apAKU_sXQJQ&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="http://youtube.googleapis.com/v/apAKU_sXQJQ&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b>Who's your favourite person you've played music with?</b><br />I hired a bunch of studio musicians in LA, when we did the soundtrack for this movie <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzIDofYWEks" target="_blank"><i>Grace of My Heart</i></a>, and I was really impressed with the banjo player. I can't remember his name, but he instantly played exactly what I thought it would sound like. He was just really awesome.<br /> <b><br />Have you got your golf clubs with you, since you're here in Scotland?</b><br />No, I played golf in Scotland once and it was miserable. It was really strange, I thought. Everyone on the course seemed really mad and pissed off. It was a weird vibe there, nobody seemed like they were having fun. It just seemed like the goal was just to play as fast as possible. Even these old guys, were just like, mean. It was a weird vibe. It wasn't fun at all. I was shocked by the whole scene. Everyone was really obsessed with how fast they could play. They didn't wanna wait for anyone. Where I'm from it's really mellow, it's like the town course, and anybody can play. People play in work boots. There's no dress code or anything.<br /> <br /><b>It's expensive to play golf here.</b><br />When I was golfing a lot it was $200 to play as many times as you want for the year.<br /><b><br />I read somewhere that you were into skydiving...</b><br />I've never done that. That was a lie. That was on a press release for a solo album I did. The whole press release was absurd. Most people took it word-for-word, but if you read the whole thing it's just absurd. It's weird that nobody was entertained by it. Because it also said I was skydiving with my dog.<br />http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2013/03/j-mascis.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-6640279937664759236Tue, 12 Feb 2013 22:43:00 +00002013-04-04T02:39:43.630-07:00Fucked UpHank Von HelveteScientologyTony SylvesterTurbonegroVolcomTurbonegro<b>Norwegian denim n' leather glam punk legends Turbonegro recently reformed, after a brief spell in limbo, with new singer - Englishman Tony Sylvester - following the departure of frontman Hank Von Helvete after his 21 years in the band. Tony fits in just perfectly, and he's a really cool guy too, so I spoke to him about hardcore, Kiss, Hank and what it's like being the new guy... </b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-0mlRYhxNRFg/URoJE4FGkjI/AAAAAAAAATg/PakObdSaXB8/s1600/Turbonegro_photoKeithMarlowe.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-0mlRYhxNRFg/URoJE4FGkjI/AAAAAAAAATg/PakObdSaXB8/s320/Turbonegro_photoKeithMarlowe.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Turbonegro, with Tony second from right. Photo by Keith Marlowe.</span></div><br /><b>How did you guys get hooked up with Volcom?</b><br />Blimey. They've always been involved. Not long after they started making clothes they started the label. Which not a lot of people know. So when they became a huge brand, they always had the record label because that was their passion. That was always what they liked doing. So they put out a couple of 7"s, and sponsored tours, and bits like that. So it's pretty good. And we've got it pretty good. We're label-mates with Wino, Torche, Valientt Thorr... So it's not bad company to be in, and there's no labels left, really. The way we are, we can afford to make out own records and then license them. So we make them ourselves, then go and find the record label afterwards. So we're not in hoc to anyone, which is a very enviable position to be in as a band.<br /><br /><b>Talking of enviable positions, how did you become part of Turbonegro?</b> <b>Are you the Sid Vicious of the band?</b><br />Yes! Simple as that! Haha! No, no... What happened was, I'd been friends with them for years - I saw the band before they split up the first time, at the one show they did in the UK - and I'd been a fan for a couple of years before that. When they came back, they kind of based themselves in London for quite a bit, and everyone kind of introduced them to me, because I was the guy who'd been banging on about this band for ages, and we became friends and I ended up doing press on the next record, which was Party Animals. Then they went on hiatus, and I actually asked Tom to join a band I was doing at the time called 33, I asked if he wanted to play bass on that.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/dZh3PF0u4Vg?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Was that your plan? Get the bassist for your band?</b><br />No, no. I knew he was at a loose end. But then, I guess after a couple of years, I ended up going to Oslo for a weekend and it coincided with them thinking about getting back together, so the whole thing meshed together rather strangely, and here we are.<br /><b><br />How much did your enthusiasm for the band lead to the reformation, new album and tour?</b><br />Definitely not the reformation, because that was them, but a lot of it was down to people's reactions. If that first show hadn't gone as well as it did then - we wouldn't have stopped - but we'd have taken it a lot slower. We would have gone and played more shows and eased into it.<br /><br /><b>Were you shitting yourself, personally?</b><br />Yeah, of course. I mean, they don't like to rehearse. We did two rehearsals and then went into that show.<br /><b><br />Did you have to rehearse much? Did you know all the songs?</b><br />There's a real difference between singing along with a band, and being the actual one doing the singing. I knew the songs as in, I could sing along with the songs. Some are easier than others!<b><br />&nbsp;</b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/RcNLZbNadN8?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>You're into your hardcore music. What do you think of the state of hardcore music today?</b><br />It's funny, there's a lot of new bands coming through that I really actually like again. The great thing about hardcore is that its conservatism is actually one of its strong points. What happens, is that everything goes off the boil and people try to make it really progressive for a while and you get some horrible things happening - like Refused - and then it kind of bangs back to what it was. Like someone comes out who's 'old sounding', and it kicks back in. There's not many genres that are like that. Black metal's kind of the same. That band Ceremony, I really like what they're doing. They're progressive in that they're regressive, if you know what I mean. I love Fucked Up. Fucked Up have a really nice take on it.<br /><br /><b>It's maybe the wrong question to ask somebody in Turbonegro, but do you not think Fucked Up's aesthetic is greater than what they actually do?</b><br />You need to go and see them. I like his voice, I like his presence. The problem with having that much schtick, is that you're going to be beaten with that schtick. If he goes on stage and doesn't strip off and cut his head open people are going to be disappointed. But under that, it's a really good band. And that's the difference between them and some other bands.<br /><b><br />Has Turbonegro's image ever been in danger of becoming bigger than what the band are?</b><br />It's funny. You have to consider the history of the band. I mean, they were a band coming out of 'authentic' hardcore, where you can't be artificial; and the grunge thing that was going on, which was deliberately contrived, with the dressing down and the "I'm not going to be a rock star" thing. So for them to be coming out and be playing squats, but with a full pyrotechnic show and make up and guitar solos; that was what appealed to me about it when I first heard them, probably in '97. I was listening to a lot of very worthy post-rock bands, who were all wearing brown and screening their own sleeves. Just this sexless, intellectual, joyless wank. They really reinvigorated my love for caveman, dunder-headed, down-stroke riff, old hardcore. Ironically they actually <i>became</i> a stadium band. Rather being a tiny band pretending to be a stadium band. So this time round it's the inverse, we're a big band pretending that we're a small band. We made a conscious effort to get rid of a lot of the gimmicks. We'll probably do it again though.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/jDqO7oYkZB4?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>It's pretty cool that this band exist, and they've got all these great songs, then you turn up and get to sing them.</b><br />Any band I've ever been in before, I've never felt like I've owed an audience anything, or that I've needed to perform anything.<br /><br /><b>You do now.</b><br />Exactly. That's the difference. Any band I've been in, we were never a draw, therefore I never felt the responsibility to actually entertain anybody. Now I'm in the position where I'm like the MC of somebody's night. If I'm good or bad it'll affect somebody's night, and somebody's put money into that. It's more of a responsibility than I've ever had before so therefore I take it a lot more seriously than I ever have before. Working on the voice, working on the actual mechanics of it. Singing's a very physical act, and it's not easy to do it several nights in a row.<br /><br /><b>Are you struggling?</b><br />I wouldn't say I was struggling, but I've had to put in the work. When you're in hardcore bands you're doing twenty minute sets, and now I'm doing hour-and-a-half sets. But we got there.<br /><b><br />After the last time I saw Turbonegro, my wife and I had a massive argument and she moved back to Australia. Can you explain this?</b> <b>I'm holding the band responsible.</b><br />I think that's fine. I think we've probably put together as many people as we've broken up. How's that?<br /><br /><b>It means fuck all to me.</b><br />Hahahaha! But you've got to look at the big picture. You only see it from your point of view!<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZTRn1lROCLw?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>What are the best and worst bands you've played with?</b><br />You get mismatched at festivals in Europe. We play higher on the bill in mainland Europe than we do here, and we've found ourselves north of the Arctic Circle with the other headliners being the Pet Shop Boys and Shaggy. Shaggy... That motherfucker can put on a show. Dude, that was fucking incredible. Probably one of the worst bands we've played with was this summer, with Kiss. Appalling. It actually made me angry, like "Is this good enough?" They got paid - to play this festival - like seven figures, and they've got all the make up, and they've got all the pyrotechnics, and they've got all the video screens, and they just can't play. It's sloppy, borderline school-band. It's terrible. They've realised what people want - the spectacle - and they haven't put the work in. They played 'Crazy Nights', which really relies on the vocal harmonies in the middle, and it's just these old men bellowing at you. Absolute crooks.<br /><b><br />Do you want to talk about Hank becoming a Scientologist and making bad dance music with Marilyn Manson's band?</b><br />I don't know what to say about that. They've been really gracious in that I've been kept out of all that completely. The only reason it got shitty of late is that there was the feeling that Hank was trying to fold-in the Turbonegro name, and the Turbojugend, into Scientology. Tom got pretty upset about that. But in all the recent interviews Hank was "I'm not doing Turbo anymore, I had to kill the character" so I never felt I was treading on anybody's toes because he'd made it so clear he didn't want to do it. But I was always a fan of Hank. Because I was a fan of the band. I didn't have to put up with what they did. I'm dandy! Hahaha!<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">More info about Volcom at <a href="http://www.volcoment.com/" target="_blank">their own site</a>. </span></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2013/02/turbonegro.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-1533098250468103140Tue, 12 Feb 2013 22:41:00 +00002013-02-12T15:01:50.262-08:00Black BananasMike NobregaRiverboat GamblersTweak BirdVolcomMike from Volcom<b>I'm sure you're probably aware of Volcom - you'll have seen the likes of Geoff Rowley, David Gonzalez and Dennis Busenitz throw themselves off (and up) all sorts of things on skateboards in their clothes for years now - but I'm not sure you know about their in-house record label, <a href="http://www.volcoment.com/" target="_blank">Volcom Entertainment</a>. They've been putting out music via downloads, CDs and - most importantly - records, for years now. Since so many bands I like have had music out on Volcom - bands like <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/turbonegro.html" target="_blank">Turbonegro</a>, Riverboat Gamblers, <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/valient-thorr.html" target="_blank">Valient Thorr</a>, High on Fire, <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/dale-crover.html" target="_blank">Melvins</a>, Harvey Milk, Tweak Bird, <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/jennifer-herrema.html" target="_blank">RTX</a>, Andrew WK, Earthless, Kurt Vile, <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/torche.html" target="_blank">Torche</a>, Best Coast and Saint Vitus - I thought we should find out what's going on. I tracked down the label's boss man, Mike Nobrega, at their Costa Mesa HQ to find out what the deal is...</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/-2KKTSbzejs?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Which came first for Volcom, the record label or the clothes?</b> <b>What do you do there?</b><br />The apparel brand started in '91, and the label pretty much came together as a fully thought out thing in '95. Eleven years ago I was hired in to work here. The label had got some notoriety through this band CKY - and some other things - and some major labels came along and wanted to do a deal where Volcom Entertainment we kind of be like a repertoire source, and develop artists that would go on to maybe be at the major label. That's where I came in, and where we really got a lot more organised as far as areas a typical 'record label' would handle. The sales and marketing, the repertoire, the development, managing the catalogue... All of the things like that.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>So you're doing the hard work for the majors? Are you not in danger of having loads of artists just pass through?</b><br />No, no. At the time, that was kind of the model, but we're not under that model any more. That went away in the late '00s. Maybe around 2007 or so. The situation with labels in the US became more dire. Labels went out of business, and you've seen over the years how it went from six giant major labels to five, to four and so on. So as we gained more independence, our bands actually stayed with us for longer. Valient Thorr have been with us since 2004, and we're about to start working on our fifth album with them. So quite the opposite happened in a way. The bands we'd been working with, from a development standpoint, actually ended up staying longer. Probably because the demands on their success we not as overblown as they would have been with a major label. A major label wants success straight away, and that's why so many bands get dropped, and careers get ruined because of that. Because we're part of this big brand, and we're a unique hybrid, we have a bit more space and a bit more breathing room to let people grow.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/bs43WaE21Zw?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>So it does it help that you're an independent label with the backing of a giant brand?</b><br />To a degree. From a financial standpoint, we're not a 'deep pocket' kind of thing. We're pretty frugal with the bands, we try to make really good financial decisions that are good for the bands down the road for years. The old system, where a band would take a large advance or something, you're really just taking a huge loan and putting yourself into debt immediately. That's just not a good way to go. It's better to be more financially responsible so that further down the road the artist will get returns, even if they're small. But returns, as opposed to anything they might gain having to get paid back because it all went out in the beginning. We're a small team here, but we work well together and we try to run our operation as honestly and realistically as possible. I think that's what appeals to a band like Torche, say. We signed Torche about this time last year, and released their album in April, and it was extremely successful for us. Really beyond what we had anticipated. All the bands are great to work with. They're all really good people.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/VsZnnuT8J3A?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>There's been some really good stuff out on the 7" Singles Club. How did that come about?</b><br />That was this guy Kurt Midness, that was his brainchild. He built it over the years. He plays in a band called <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/jennifer-herrema.html" target="_blank">Black Bananas</a>, and he has really good taste in music. It's become really respected and renowned, and it's something we're all very proud of. Everything from making the records, to designing them, to curating the release - he's done all that stuff.<br /><br /><b>How independently does the Volcom label operate from the Volcom clothes brand? Do you pass each other in the corridor?</b><br />Oh, absolutely. We're all in the same building. Our office is smack dab in the middle of the creative area of the building. It's a pretty large building, and there's a lot of people, but from a company standpoint we are actually a separate company within the corporation. From a marketing standpoint, and a branding standpoint, it all works together hand in hand. To them, we're a component of marketing; and to us we're a label to our artists. It all flows. We have our own autonomy over the label. Honestly man, Volcom is a really great place to work. They foster everybody's creativity and talent. They give you the room to do your thing and to experiment, and I think that's what makes the brand successful overall. I think you can see in the stuff that comes out of Volcom that they really appreciate art.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/b5D4hk97X5o?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>What have your personal highlights been, as far as music that you've released?</b><br />Jeez, there's a lot. Like I said, the bulk of our roster has really been here as long as I've been here. Riverboat Gamblers and Valient Thorr and all those things. Really, the highlight is just seeing them all grow! In 2004 Valient Thorr was just an obscure, weird little band from the southern part of the US, with a loud voice and a crazy look, you know? But seeing them develop, into a band that's toured the world, and is known all over the world, that's a big highlight! I think the whole thing is a highlight!<br /><br /><b>Cool. What can we expect from the label in 2013?</b><br />We're gonna continue along with the Turbonegro record, and the relationship there. That's been a relationship that the brand has had for a long time, but we never had the opportunity to do records with them until recently so we're very happy about that. They've got the fascinating twenty year history so we're really happy to be working with them. That, and Valient Thorr are going to be releasing a new record in the summertime. They'll be touring all over the world. Then we've got some new bands. There's a young band from Orange County called the Lovely Bad Things; their first full length is coming up in February. Out of New York we have a young bunch of guys called The Dirty Fences, and we're doing their first full length this year too. So we have our long-term artists that we're continuing to work with, then we've got some talent that's coming up. It's a really nice mix.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.volcoment.com/" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="236" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-IwZQnY-os6M/URq-HpMfcDI/AAAAAAAAAT4/dTagQZv3hio/s320/newvolcomentlogoJPEG.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Check the <a href="http://www.volcoment.com/" target="_blank">Volcom Entertainment website</a> for a cubic assload of cool shit.</span></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2013/02/im-sure-youre-probably-aware-of-volcom.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-3248312926619564077Tue, 12 Feb 2013 22:38:00 +00002013-02-12T14:38:51.642-08:00Valient HimselfValient ThorrVolcomValient Thorr<b>The longest-standing band on the <a href="http://www.volcoment.com/" target="_blank">Volcom</a> roster, Valient Thorr have been making insane, raw, outer-galactic rock n' roll for the label since 2004. As the recording of their fifth album (and preparations for a global tour) get underway, I spoke to leader and vocalist Valient Himself...</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ewUYYAGHzvE/URrCJBnBDAI/AAAAAAAAAUA/vn0sdEdP1Ik/s1600/Valient+Thorr.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="224" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ewUYYAGHzvE/URrCJBnBDAI/AAAAAAAAAUA/vn0sdEdP1Ik/s320/Valient+Thorr.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><span style="color: #cccccc;"><b><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><b>Who are <span>Valient</span> <span>Thorr</span>?<br /></b></span></b><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">We are. You can either look at is as five dudes who came here from the planet Venus and ended up playing rock and roll to spread messages of peace and tolerance to a war torn planet Earth, OR you can say we are thousands of like minded people who understand what it means to be humanitarians, judge not, mind our own business when it comes to 'wedge' issues, help others always not matter what, and spread posi vibes the world over.</span><b><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><b></b></span></b></span><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><b>&nbsp;</b></span></span><br /><br /><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><b>What&nbsp;<i>is</i>&nbsp;<span>Valient</span> <span>Thorr</span>?</b></span></span><br /><span style="color: #cccccc;"></span><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">A collection of stories that we are actively living, hopefully leading up to the eventual salvation of most of the human race through fast music that tries to inspire others to exfoliate the bad and soak in the good times.<b><div><br />You had a big summer of touring. Where did you get to? Did you see anybody cool?</div></b></span></span></div><div><span style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #222222; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">We did US and Europe. Saw a lot of rad stuff. &nbsp;Some of my favorite things was seeing Sean Kuti and Egypt 80 at Jazzfest in New Orleans, Ivan Neville and Dumpstaphunk at Bonnaroo in Tennessee, The Obsessed, Sleep, Danava and Voivod at Roadburn in Tilburg Netherlands, and Orange Goblin were great at Desertfest in London. So many shows, buddies, and crazy times, its really hard to remember it all. You have to sit back and think really hard.</span></span></div><div><span style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #222222; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">&nbsp;</span><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/FJ9MAaeCWo0?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;">&nbsp;</span></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;">Who's the best band you've played with?</span></div></b></span></div><div><span style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #222222; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"></span>That's too tough of a question. We've played with <span style="color: #cccccc;"><i><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif;">so</span></i></span> many good bands. Known and unknown. I guess out of the known bands, some of the best were Motörhead, Gogol Bordello, Mastodon and The Stooges. I think the best bands I've ever <i>seen</i> were Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Melvins, and Sean Kuti.</div><div><span style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #222222; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><b></b><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><b>&nbsp;</b></span></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><b>You're from Chapel Hill. There's a load of bands from Chapel Hill - who do you like from there, and who lets the place down?</b></span></div></span></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">I think my favorites from the old days are Archers of Loaf and Polvo. I think some new bands to check out are Caltrop, T0w3rs, Black Skies and Colossus. I wouldn't pay attention to any that let you down. Raleigh is where a lot of us stay now too. We are spread out all over NC. Demon Eye, Birds of Avalon, Thunderlip, Salvacion, Mountain Thrower, The Dynamite Brothers, 2013 Wolves, Crusades and Bitter Resolve are other great NC bands at the moment off the top of my head.<b><div><br />How did you get together with Volcom, and how did the split with High on Fire come about?<br /><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">We met Volcom reps and company dudes way back in 2003 after completing our first album ourselves. We played a show with then recently signed band ASG in Wilmington, and they asked us to do couple things, then asked us to put out a record with them in '04. Then we quit our jobs and lived on the road the next three years solid. Over the years we've made countless buds. Volcom has a seven inch vinyl club and puts out<b> </b>twelve splits a year. We did one with HR from Bad Brains a few years back and then when this came up, we've known Jeff since he played bass with Zeke, and we've known Matt from a good number of years now. The suggestion to do something like that was made two years before it happened when we were out with Mastodon. Some times it takes a while for things to come to fruition.</span></span></div></b></span></span></div><div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><b><br /></b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/8k8kMRlwhQw?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div><b>&nbsp;</b></div><div><b>What are your three favourite movies made between 1980 and 1985?</b></div></span></span></div></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">That's way too hard. <i>But<b> </b></i>- If pressured, I'd say, number three Mad Max, number two River's Edge and number one, Big Trouble in Little China.</span></span></div><div><br /><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><b><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><b><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><b>What's the best album artwork you've ever seen?</b></span></span></b><div><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Not afraid to ask the tough ones, huh? I don't know about favorite, but I've always loved D.I. - Horse Bites Dog Cries. My brain hurts too much to think of others.</span></span></span></div></span></span><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">&nbsp;</span></span></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><b></b></span></span></div><div><b>What's the most injured you've seen somebody get at one of your shows?</b><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><b><br /></b></span></span></div></div></b></span></span></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Hmmm. I've seen a few chicks get clocked by Nitewolf's bass. I've been knocked by guitars pretty bad before. The weirdest worst one I guess was when we were in France at the end of a tour in like '08, the music stops and all of a sudden I saw this kid come flying down to the floor from the upper balcony. Like almost on my head, just missed the stage. I immediately started laughing, then decided we better check if he was OK. It was just so unexpected, I couldn't stop laughing. He ended up being OK. 99% of the time, people are cool to each other at our shows. I usually try to intervene quickly to squash quabbles and try not to interrupt the show.<b><br /></b><div><br /><b>Mark Mothersbaugh does kids TV music. Can you see yourself doing that in the future?</b></div></span></span></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">I would <i>love</i> to. Even more than that, I would love to do voiceovers for cartoons. I'm actively pursuing a voiceover career. So anyone out there working production... I'm available.</span></span></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><b><br /></b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/EZgRH0kE5yU?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div><b>&nbsp;</b></div><div><b>Do you guys skate much?</b></div></span></span></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">I just cruise on a mini board, but Nitewolf rips and Eidan <span>Thorr</span> is still known to get down from time to time as well.<b><br /> </b><div><br /><b>Are you annoyed or flattered that Chris Haslam stole your hair, your beard and your clothes?</b></div></span></span></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Hahaha! I don't think it was like that. I know Chris, he digs the band, we're buds. I'm pretty sure it was a coincidence. He's said he gets people yelling "<span>Valient</span>" to him, and when I skate around town in Costa Mesa, I've heard people yelling "Haslam" as I'm cruising by.<b><br /></b><div><br /><b>Mötley Crüe or Suicidal Tendencies?</b></div></span></span></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Is that even a question? S-T baby! <i>Fuck</i> </span></span><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Mötley Crüe! Suicidal Tendencies were a thousand times better the whole length of their careers. Even their bad stuff is better.<b><br /></b><div><br /><b>Steve Albini or Bon Scott?</b><br /><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Bon Scott. I mean, I like a couple Shellac songs, and he's a pretty good producer, but Bon Scott is Bon Scott!</span></span><br /> </div></span></span></div><div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /><b>What are your next plans?</b>&nbsp;<b>Are you coming back to the UK any time soon?</b>&nbsp;<b>It must be about time for another album...</b></span></span></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse;">I can't tell you anything except we are holed up working. You know us, we'll be back soon.</span></span></span></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse;">&nbsp;</span></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/DhotSBFQzFQ?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse;">&nbsp;</span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Find out everything <span style="font-size: x-small;">else</span> at the <a href="http://www.volcoment.com/" target="_blank">Volcom Entertainment website.</a></span> </span></span></span></div></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2013/02/valient-thorr.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-6403884109018361463Wed, 09 Jan 2013 19:43:00 +00002013-01-09T11:43:08.019-08:00D-BlockGhostface KillahGZAMethod ManSheek LouchWu BlockWu-TangGhostface Killah and Sheek Louch - Wu Block<span style="font-size: small;"><b><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span>Born from the minds of the <span>Wu</span>-Tang Clan's Ghostface Killah and D-<span>Block</span>'s Sheek Louch, the first album by their collaboration <span>Wu</span> <span>Block</span> features Ghost and Sheek joined by Method Man, Raekwon, <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/gza.html" target="_blank">GZA</a>, Mastah Killah, Jadakiss, Styles P and Erykah Badu; so you can be assured it's a banger. Essentially a full-blown <span>Wu</span>-Tang/D-<span>Block</span> collabo, </span><span><span>it's an album of exactly the kind of raw, original street genius you'd expect from from this line-up of New York hip-hop royalty.</span> Ghostface has already said of it: "This is a unique street album combination, like milk with oatmeal. And a dash of cinnamon. We got killing on lock. It's like assassination day - nothing but darts being thrown. It's like Batman and Robin shit. It's real street shit for the fans. They've been thirstin' for this". Based on this description, I thought I should ask him and Sheek what the deal is with <span>Wu</span> <span>Block</span> - and hip-hop in general.</span></span></b></span><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><br /></span></span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/QUp8W8n2yak?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b>So what's <span>Wu</span> <span>Block</span>? How did it come about?</b><br />S: <span>Wu</span> <span>Block</span> is a classic bunch of motherfuckers, it started with me and Ghost, running around together and us having a respect for each other and getting on each other's projects. We just figured out we had this whole body of music, and said, "Yo, let's put some shit together and give the street something that it's been missing", and other cats came about you know, and just sprinkled their little bits and pieces everywhere. Classic project, man. The Lox and <span>Wu</span>-Tang.<br /> <b><br />Did you mean for it to be as big a thing as it is?</b><br />S: What up, what up - what I had I mind - I thought it was going to be me and Ghost, and he just painted this picture man, like "<i>Everybody</i>'s gonna be on this", then it just turned into something crazy. I give all that credit to Ghost.<br /> G: If it's called <span>Wu</span> <span>Block</span>, it just makes sense. OK, you got D-<span>Block</span>, you got <span>Wu</span>-Tang, we just merged all of that shit in one and just made a bigger project. You know what I mean? Me and Sheek.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /><a href="http://littleliedown.wordpress.com/" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="301" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-8F7LxTeDG2s/UO3ADtf3gaI/AAAAAAAAATM/lpwKcDz83p4/s400/wu-block-breakfast.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://littleliedown.wordpress.com/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Illustration by Andy Smoke. </span></a><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b>How does it work? I mean, who does what?</b><br /> S: We're together a lot. Like when we're touring. Me and Ghost lay the foundation, and then we'll say "Hey yo, Method Man will sound <i>crazy</i> on this", and we'll get him in there, and he'll hear it, and tell us what he think, and then we get Styles, and Jada, you know? We'll be together a lot. <br /> G: This ain't no pieced-together shit, because you can't just put somebody on a certain track. That's coming from my side. If you don't fit there, you can't get on that. It's like he said there. It's like making clothes. That shit is tightly knitted, tightly stitched, you know what I mean? <i>Fine</i> stitched with the right shit, the right material. That's how we came out to make this great album. It's not just thrown together. It's not "OK, you can rhyme. Get on that because you can rhyme". Nah, nah. From who wrote the song, to the line-up of the song, to the order of the song, to everything. Everything just gotta be right, you know? That's what <span>Wu</span> <span>Block</span> is about right now.<br /> <b><br />So this is definitely a collaboration, rather than a compilation? There's a fine line sometimes.</b><br />G: Our shit is homegrown. Even the stories we got on there, you can tell we was all in there together, and how we feed off each other. When you hear it you know. It's just crazy, man.<br /> <b><br />Can you tell when you're writing a single, and when you're writing an album track?</b><br />G: You might have an idea of what could <i>be</i> a single, but for the most part when you finish that shit, when you finish all that, that's when you look at it and go "OK, this is what it is right here". When it's done. It's the streets and the producer of the album that are really gonna pick your song. When you sit back and listen to all the shit you did, one by one, that's when it's "Oh shit, this one stands out a <i>lot</i>", you know? Then you make a radio mix, and there you go - you got it.<b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/rGRJ8pyd8E4?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b>Anybody can make tracks nowadays and put them out on a blog or whatever. What do you think about that? Is it detrimental to the overall quality of hip-hop now?</b><br />G: For me, hip-hop is 100% watered-down right now. I have to say this. I love it, as far as the art, and for how it gives motherfuckers a chance to get out there. Motherfuckers from China, Japan, wherever, motherfuckers who would have been in trouble. As an outlet, it's got me into movies and all kinds of shit. But the watered-down part I'm talking about, there's no more thought process in what motherfuckers are saying on the mic no more. Lyrically.<br /> S: Right. Right.<br />G: If the beat is hot, they'll call it a day. They got their ringtone record, and they don't give a fuck about what they're saying on all the rest of the album. There's no more creative development, there's no more artist development now. You can't say to rappers now "I love all your old shit". They've only got one record. There's no substance to it. Everything is the same. Do you wanna sit through an album with fourteen songs - and it's fourteen fuckin' club records on it all day? To me, a great artist is one who can sit there, and make great music, and through that music paint a picture. I don't wanna be in the club for fourteen fuckin' records, because there's only so much you can talk about on that shit. Your jewellery, your bitches, your drugs, your cars. You know what I mean? Luxuries. And that's about it. And you wanna give me that for fourteen records? I'll be like, "Nah, tell me something!" Their struggle, tell me about that struggle shit. Let me hear what you went through, or let me just hear your imagination. That's what it's like with us, we have all that. We have records where we're rhyming, we have records where we're just jivin' around, we have stylistic records; we have Sheek, and Genius, and Masta Killa and it just sounds beautiful.<br /><br /><b>I grew up listening to <span>Wu</span>-Tang, but this shit sounds really fresh.</b><br />G: Identification is a must, man, with this shit. Motherfuckers gotta relate to you, and you don't wanna let them down but you gotta show 'em growth on this shit, like where we been all this time. For the person that loves real hip-hop, that's into not just lyrics, but <i>everything</i> - style, whatever the case may be - you're gonna feed off that on this. It's that time right now. What we gotta do is make sure that the masses are aware of it, and we can just do the rest.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /><b></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/WwcGr2YRnys?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b>What do you think of artists playing full albums live - old albums - rather than making new music?</b>&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: left;">G: People do that?<b><br /><br />Yeah man, GZA toured 'Liquid Swords'. Public Enemy did 'Nation of Millions'.<br /> </b>G:<b> </b>Those are classics! You can't deny a classic.<b> </b>Music is not how it used to be. Brothers are not pushing music like that, where everybody got something new coming every year or whatever the case may be. But that classic? That's what's left in people's minds.<b> </b>But it's not even old people, I've been to shows where there's kids eleven years old that are singing that shit. That's a plus! That means that you got fans still coming out for your old, old shit.<b> </b>You can do this shit like the fuckin' Beatles, man!<br />S: Yeah. Forever.<br />G: Ain't nothing wrong with it, to stay on top. For those type of fans, you gotta keep givin' it to them. Like, I don't wanna wait two years to do another album!<b> </b>Let me put out an album in like a year, and inbetween that time let me just put songs out. Just songs, and songs. Even if they're not on the album. But yo, make sure you do an album release once a year. A year to eighteen months.<b><br /><br />What about people who don't do that? When you've got Lil B and A$AP Rocky making a <i>track</i> that almost lasts a year. Do you think the art of the hip-hop album is dying?</b></div><div style="text-align: left;">G: Pretty soon it's just gonna be all single deals. Remember I said that. It's gonna be all single deals. Brothers like that, they're not ready to put a whole project together. They just want to live through those songs. They'll put it out when they get ready. Everybody's different. Ain't nothin' gonna stay the same.<b> </b>Our thing is that we gotta remain who we are, but at the same time know when to adapt.<b> </b>You have to learn to adapt. For example, when Marvin Gaye was doing all that sexy shit, 'Let's Get It On', all that fly shit he was doin' back in the day<b>,</b> there came a time where he went through a whole period where he skipped off to fuckin' Europe to write songs. And by that time the disco era was coming in. And he had to adapt to it. He fucked around, and he made 'Sexual Healing' , but he didn't know that 'Sexual Healing' was gonna be <i>that</i> song, because everything was changing. So he had people listening to it for him, and he was scared. But then it came out and it did what it did. When times change, sometimes you gotta change with the times, but still have your shit on it, you know what I mean?<b> </b>You do what you do, but you gotta recognise that it's a new wave now. And that's what's goin' on right now with all this other shit, B.<b><br />&nbsp;</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object width="320" height="266" class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="http://0.gvt0.com/vi/aOIbnqx_kGQ/0.jpg"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/aOIbnqx_kGQ&fs=1&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/aOIbnqx_kGQ&fs=1&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b>Do you look forward to changing with the times? You guys kinda changed the times yourselves in the past.</b>&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: left;">G: I'm always gonna keep my ear to the street. I'm not gonna become no-one else, but I'm always gonna have my ear to the street. You have to, if you're gonna stay in the game. When we get up to go today we're gonna turn the radio on and see what the hottest beat is, so we can freestyle to it. My friend, who's downstairs playing pool right now, I'll ask him who's hot right now. And tomorrow he might tell you something different. And then next week it's another rapper. It's that quick that it changes. You gotta keep your ear to that shit, man.<b><br /><br />Who's new that stands out to you?</b></div><div style="text-align: left;">G: I like J. Cole. Uncle Murda. Is Drake considered old or new?<b><br /><br />Both, I think.</b></div><div style="text-align: left;">G: Yeah, he's somewhere in the middle.<br />S: That's just going with the main shit. That's not the underground shit right there.<b> <br /> </b>G: Here's what it is. You got brothers, and they know how to rhyme and stuff like that, so you can't sleep on 'em and shit, but the music changed. It ain't just about samples and all that other shit, like how it was back, back, back before. Now you have bigger beats now.<b> </b>It sounds like there's a lot of different musics comin' in. You gotta adapt. You gotta play that same card that they can play, but still keep your cards, you feel me? A'ight, so say for instance you're doing an album, and let's say you did do a radio record with them big-ass beats or whatever the case may be, you still gotta have - on the rest of the album - some of your shit that you know your people know <i>you</i> for.<b> </b>Or you're gonna lose 'em.<b><br /><br />What's your next move, once the <span>Wu</span> <span>Block</span> album is out?</b></div><div style="text-align: left;">G: We got a lot of work. He's got the D-<span>Block</span> album to finish, and I'm gonna fuck around and finish my Supreme <i>(Clientele)</i> 'Blue &amp; Cream' album.<b> </b>It's just a bunch of work we're gonna be doing. We're gonna keep it moving. But we're definitely gonna tour off this.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/ut93VySrgSk?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">(Thanks again to the brilliant Andy Smoke for another rad illustration. Check out more of his genius - including some amazing mixes - at his blog, <a href="http://littleliedown.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Little Lie Down</a>.)</div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2013/01/ghostface-killah-and-sheek-louch-wu.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-2678872560338955072Thu, 13 Dec 2012 21:28:00 +00002012-12-14T04:47:55.379-08:00Fear and LoathingJehstJimmy SavileKashmereYNRYoung N RestlessJehst and Kashmere<b>Existing as he does, as one of the most respected producers/MCs/lyricists in UK hip-hop, Jehst can pretty much do whatever he likes. Hell, if he wanted to make a concept album with his mate Kashmere based on 'Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas' - Hunter S. Thompson's legendary seedy, corrupted, acid trip to the post-hippy dark heart of the supposed American dream - then who's to stop him? Nobody, that's who. And that very album, 'Kingdom of Fear', is out now on his own YNR Productions label.<br /> Bite My Wire managed to get Jehst and Kashmere in the same place for long enough to find out what the fuck is going on. Perhaps, if they explain things, we'll rest easy...</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xhW0-3-elw4/UMpDYWPC1LI/AAAAAAAAASQ/m5tTg5gyU8Y/s1600/KOF+ONLINE+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="265" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xhW0-3-elw4/UMpDYWPC1LI/AAAAAAAAASQ/m5tTg5gyU8Y/s400/KOF+ONLINE+1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Kashmere and Jehst</span><b><b> </b></b><span style="font-size: x-small;">on drugs</span><b><b><br /></b></b></div><br /><b><b>How did Kingdom of Fear come about? Obviously you guys have worked together in the past...</b></b><br />J: It's something that we both talked about. We were both working on different projects, and it was at a time when rap in this country was starting to get commercial. A lot of people had a lot of business concerns wrapped up in the music, and creativity was getting slowed down by all the politics and the business. We just wanted to get back to the essence of making music in the moment, and enjoying the process, and it actually <i>not</i> being preconceived. Like, what happened in the session is that we'd do a track, and then we were onto the next thing. I remember Kashmere saying at the time, that the reason an album is called an album, is because it's a record of that time, in the way that a photo album is an album. It shouldn't necessarily be a compilation of ideas. I think nowadays, especially in rap, most albums are put together on the basis of box-ticking. "We've got this producer, we've got this collab..." And that was starting to be the case even with the UK underground. We were just bored of everything. We didn't even know what we were going to do. Kash brought the Hunter aspect - that concept - to it.<br />K: A lot of people probably aren't going to get it by listening to it, but this album was about agriculture. We're just trying to put it out there, to tell everyone to support their local farms. Because without farms, where are you? You know? What can you do? Life is just pointless without farms.<b><b></b></b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/cEEe5fhgat8?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b><b>So you just sat down to make an album, then Kash decided it'd be like this?</b></b><br />J: Nah. I won a competition, and I got some free tickets to fly to Los Angeles, and when we got to LA, we thought "Let's do a little road trip", and we actually started living the Hunter S. Thompson lifestyle without even realising we were doing it. Then once we realised it had all been done before, and that we were just biters, we thought that if we were going to be biters we might as well just be true to it. Like all hip-hop goes back to the sample, and we stay true to where the original idea came from, and we just said "Fuck it", and just ran with it. It just <i>became</i> Kingdom of Fear.<br />K: Plus, it's really expensive to hire cars out there, you know?<br />J: You know what they say, 'Don't drink and drive, smoke a spliff and fly home'. That's actually where I made my millions. I've got a 25% share in a t-shirt company based in Scarborough, and they were one of the first people to actually print the 'Don't drink and drive, smoke a spliff and fly home' t-shirts. I don't need rap music! I just do that shit for fun. All that shit where I rap about being broke, what I mean is, I'm broke <i>doing rap</i>. Because that ain't paying me. I'm not being silly, I've got billions in the bank, off the t-shirts.<br />K: He doesn't like to show it off.<b><br /><br /><b>Yeah, you actually wouldn't think you were as rich as that.</b></b><br />J: What I'm saying is, rhyme doesn't pay. Crime pays, and t-shirts pay better. Merchandise is the future of the whole music industry. People say that live shows are the future of the music industry, but the reality is, we've got hologram-Snoop now.<br />K: Tupac.<br />J: Oh yeah, sorry - hologram-Tupac. Snoop's real, right? I thought Tupac was still alive, and the hologram was just him revealing that. Because Elvis is still alive, you know? He actually rents a room from me in Brockley. I was confused because Snoop has now reincarnated himself as a lion. I think Snoop's maybe been doing more drugs than we have.<br />K: He kind of reminds me of the eighties TV show, 'Manimal'. Where the guy could transform into different animals. And I think Snoop has really shown people how it's done.<br />J: But Snoop is frontin', he's not being true. He needs to do a video like Manimal, the way we did Kingdom of Fear, and just say "Look, I'm biting my whole shit. I'm on a Manimal thing". Do you remember Manimal?<b><br /><br /><b>I do, yep.</b></b><br />J: What about Trumpton? Do you remember Trumpton?<b><br /><b>&nbsp;</b></b><br /><b><b>Hell yeah man.</b> <b><br /></b></b>K: Believer.<b><b><br /></b></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/T8skgGhrVCs?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b><b>Right, Hunter S. Thompson is known for just <i>how</i> American he is. Was it easy to translate that into a UK hip-hop album?</b><br /> </b>K: It wasn't hard, man. We just went to McDonald's, and got a bunch of Big Macs. Because that's really the main American thing. McDonald's is bigger than Hunter S. Thompson. That's on the real. Starbucks.<br />J: When I was growing up I just wanted to be a member of the A-Team.<b><br /><br /><b>Don't you any more?</b></b><br />J: I am now. I'm B.A. Baracus. I'm Plan A. That's why Plan B's called Plan B. But just look at B.A. Baracus. A lot of people don't realise this, but my make-up artist is a genius. Eminem was blowing up around the time I came out, so we figured out that if I whited myself up I'd sell more records. If you saw my mum, you'd understand that I look a lot like B.A. Baracus. As long as I don't wear the feather earring, then it's cool. If I wear those feather earrings people are just hollering at me in the street, going "Mr. T! Mr. T!" Some people think it's a gay thing. How is that gay, dungarees and Converse? And a mohawk, and feather earrings? And the gold chains?! Eric B and Rakim had gold chains, are you telling me Eric B and Rakim are gay?<b><br /><br /><b>So now that we know how wealthy you are...</b></b><br />J: He's on Disability Allowance because he's a drug addict.<b><br /><br /><b>Did you take a lot of drugs making the album?</b></b><br />J: He wasn't a drug addict before we made the album! Hahaha! Mainly just Ajax.<b><br /><b>&nbsp;</b></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/GIBBjCkLEwU?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b><b>When people like you two, and somebody like Dizzee, are obviously multi-millionaires, what do you feel about people like Task Force who are not?</b></b><br />J: I think Task Force should have invested more money in their t-shirt printing. I used to wear the Grafdabusup t-shirt and the Wha Blo t-shirt, but where Task Force went wrong, is that they spent to much time trying to make good music, and writing good lyrics. Whereas if I can refer to the artist you just named, I mean, he doesn't does he? You can just leave his name blank, so we could be talking about anybody. I'm being a bit silly, but let's be real - that's all it is. It's not all about rap, or hip-hop, it's the same for any form of art. Any form of artistic expression. You come into it thinking it's the industry for making money from your art, and it's not. Everything's about celebrity culture, everything's about fucking social-network-following, reality TV bullshit. There's not really that much place for people who are trying to do something from the heart, to make paper. I don't want to get too into the politics. You know what, much love and respect to Task Force. They were a huge influence on me, I love those guys. I love their shit. I don't want to get too much into who did what, and what happened to who, but we're from a time where people still looked at the type of music that we do with the eyes that it would never, ever make anybody any money. So it was never a concern for us. When we started making money it was a surprise. And that spawned the generation that capitalised on the opportunity to make money out of rap music, out of hip-hop culture or whatever in the UK. So you had a generation where some guys came along then disappeared real quickly, and some guys went on to make fortunes. A lot of the guys who did make fortunes did it by changing up their whole styles, and realising it's a business. That's all it is. I handle my business because I gotta pay my rent and I gotta eat, but you know, fuck business, fuck capitalism, fuck the 'indusrty' side of music. It's just an industry like everything else, except you don't put on a shirt and tie. That's the only difference. You put on some skinny jeans and some fucking Blazers or whatever it is. Most of them have got office-job mentality and I hate most people in the music industry. Even the ones that I like. Can we go back to talking about Ajax?<b><br /><br /><b>Of course.</b></b><br />J: Ajax gets your whites whiter than the leading brand. I won't get my payment if you don't print that. I've got an investment in Ajax, along with the t-shirt company, but I don't like to mix up the two businesses. They're two separate things.<b><b><br />&nbsp;</b></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-o7CtLij8tws/UMpHOZM-MGI/AAAAAAAAASg/AZsaIH_Jy1E/s1600/jehstkashJT.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="280" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-o7CtLij8tws/UMpHOZM-MGI/AAAAAAAAASg/AZsaIH_Jy1E/s400/jehstkashJT.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Kashmere and Jehst in the Stockwell Arms. Photo by J<span style="font-size: x-small;">ames</span> Thompson.</span><b><b> </b></b></div><br /><b><b>The album only took two weeks to make. That's not very long. Did you rush it or something?</b></b><br />J: It took two weeks to make, but then we sat on it for about twenty years. And it took somebody about forty years to make a video for it.<br />K: For real, was it rushed? Nah, it didn't feel like it. I was rushin'.<br />J: Yeah, we were rushin'! It was fun. The last solo album I did took six years, that wasn't much fun. We produced the Steps comeback album. Take That smashed it with the comeback album, so why can't Steps do it? Because I'm their ghost writer, they've got a lot of new stuff ready to go. And we produced a lot of their stuff with Shock G from Digital Underground, he helped out a lot. And Hammer was our business consultant. Do you remember Ya Kid K?<b><br /><br /><b>Yeah, from Technotronic.</b></b><br />J: Well Ya Kid K is now known as A$AP Rocky, I don't know if you know that.<b><br /><b><br />Wow. I did not know that. What are your plans for when this album comes out? Do you just sit back and watch the money roll in?</b><br /> </b>K: The money has already rolled in, you know what I'm saying?<br />J: When the album comes out we have to start <i>counting</i> the money. The problem is that we have to pay people to count the money. It's really confusing, because we can't really budget how much we have to pay these motherfuckers to count our money, until they've counted the money.<br />K: When they start counting the money, that's when counting the money gets serious. Because counting money, is counting money. And you've been to the bank before, they're very serious in the bank. Because they're counting that money.<br />J: Because of the financial arrangement we have with the money counters, we have had to set up a Fritzl-style basement situation, to keep them motivated to work.<b><br /><b><br />I can understand that.</b></b><br />J: I'm just going to put this out, and this is an exclusive - if you sell this on we'll sue you - when we removed Jimmy Saville's gravestone the other night, we actually took that down into our Fritzl-style basement where we keep our money counters, and showed them, and smashed it up in front of them. We said "Your whole life could go the same as Jimmy. He thought he'd got away with it. But we'll come back for you. Even in the grave". So, you know, that helped to motivate the money counting.<b><b><br />&nbsp;</b></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="http://3.gvt0.com/vi/0_9b2d-Pcl8/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/0_9b2d-Pcl8&fs=1&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/0_9b2d-Pcl8&fs=1&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b><b>Did you guys have much to do with the downfall of the late Jimmy Savile? I mean, you moved in similar circles...</b></b><br />J: Hold up, I don't know if we can respond to that. We moved in the same circles? I might have to talk to my lawyer about that. You know what, I'm not going to say that we did, but also, I'm not going to say that we didn't. It was crazy times. The seventies was a crazy time. Certain things happened. We weren't <i>aware</i> of everything Jimmy was doing at the time.<b><br /><br /><b>So it just didn't seem wrong at the time?</b></b><br />J: You know what, I never saw Jimmy in those kind of scenarios. We only ever went out tracksuit shopping, or for a little bit of jewellery. We'd argue a lot of the time, because what me and Jimmy had to do, we'd ring each other before a night out, and say "You're not wearing that tracksuit, are you?" because we'd always buy matching tracksuits.<br />K: Listen, Jehst <i>always</i> thought he was cool. I always thought he had a problem.<br />J: That's because he touched you.<br />K: I always kept my trousers on.<br />J: He touched you through your trousers. That's what I heard.<br />K: I wore a pair of boxer shorts, a pair of tracksuit bottoms, <i>and</i> a pair of jeans. And a chastity belt. Over the top of all of that. And a condom.<br />J: You did wear all of that protective clothing, but then to put a thong on over the top? I think you maybe gave him the wrong impression, and the chastity belt did look a lot like a red codpiece. You look a lot like Cameo! And I've never seen you both in the same place at the same time. That's an exclusive. 'Kashmere and Cameo never seen in same place at same time - YOU work it out'.<br /><br /><b> </b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Sa_zZfJaOdM/UMsfjoqR15I/AAAAAAAAAS0/n0Pd17kr_nA/s1600/IMG_7842-edit.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="265" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Sa_zZfJaOdM/UMsfjoqR15I/AAAAAAAAAS0/n0Pd17kr_nA/s400/IMG_7842-edit.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">Jehst and Kashmere. Photo by James Thompson.</span><b><br /></b></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2012/12/jehst-and-kashmere.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-8105770724455065547Thu, 08 Nov 2012 15:54:00 +00002012-11-08T15:47:12.243-08:00HarmonicraftMelvinsTorcheVolcomTorche<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt;">Torche, of Miami, Florida, recently steamrolled their way across Europe to celebrate the launch of their third album, 'Harmonicraft'. They make this rad, super-heavy stoner/sludge pop music, and are now being adored by the hipster indie press as much as they are by the metal community. Suitably, everybody agrees that they're amazing. The new album is out on <a href="http://www.volcoment.com/" target="_blank">Volcom</a>, so I thought I should say hello.</span></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-r0XdNmXUGZk/UJvJD6isriI/AAAAAAAAARo/Ftc7Nnu8778/s1600/TorcheNov2011CLR-131-Copeland.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-r0XdNmXUGZk/UJvJD6isriI/AAAAAAAAARo/Ftc7Nnu8778/s320/TorcheNov2011CLR-131-Copeland.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">&nbsp;Photograph by Gary Copeland</span><b><br /></b></div><br /><b>OK, introduce yourselves.</b><br />S: Steve Brooks. I sing and play guitar.<br />R: Rick Smith. I play drums.<br />A: Andrew Elstner. I play guitar and sing back ups. Jon is out eating.<br /><b><br />You've been signed to <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/mogwai.html" target="_blank">Mogwai</a>'s Rock Action label in Europe. How did that compare to a US label? How did you get hooked up with them?</b><br />R: In 2005 - or 2006 - we toured with Mogwai in the States, and on that tour we became friends with them. I don't even remember how it came about, but we somehow got an offer from them to do the European version of our first full-length record. And we said "Hell Yeah." It was awesome. I've been a Mogwai fan for a long while now, so when they asked us if they could do the record we were excited about it. As far as the experience goes, working with the label goes, we just let them run with it and do their own thing with it.<br /><br /><b>Did you record it with them, at their studio?</b><br />R: No, we did it in the States and a different record label, Robotic Empire, actually released it in the States first. Then Mogwai released it in Europe after. So it was already a recorded record. Both records they did for us we already had recorded for another label already, they were just doing the European licensed version.<br /><b><br />Are you going to do more with them?</b><br />R: Umm, at the moment the labels we work with have European distribution pretty heavily, so there's almost no need to, I guess, in some ways. But it was a cool experience. They're awesome dudes, and the label is very cool too.&nbsp;<b></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/F1obEt5dmmo?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Is there a discernible difference between working with a conventional label, run by musicians, and working with a label like Volcom, which has kind of come to be through their dealings in skateboarding and whatnot?</b> <b>Obviously they've been putting out some killer stuff recently...</b><br />R: Oh yeah.<br />S: Yep.<br />A: I think it's fuckin' awesome, the Volcom thing. Obviously I have no experience - as the new dude in the band - as to how Rock Action was as an experience, apart from total respect. With Volcom - to be blunt - the reach is a little more broad and the pockets are a little more deep. And it's a label that's part of a 'lifestyle' company, you know? They've been selling clothing to skateboarders, snowboarders and surfers since like, the eighties?<br />S: The nineties I think.<br /><br /><b>Yeah, the early nineties.</b><br />A: Yeah, so they've been fuckin' amazing. There's been no hassle. There's been nothing but positive support from those guys.<br />S: Especially now, when it's hard to get the support that a lot of bands used to get from labels. They're able to market us in different ways, because of the different aspects of their company.<br /><br /><b>You're being interviewed for a skateboard magazine right now.</b><br />S: Yeah.<br />A: But they have money coming in from different things other than <i>just</i> records, so there's a little less pressure... In a positive way! It's not like it makes us lazy.<br />S: They gave us a good deal. And it's the same with all the other labels we've been on, we really know the people we're working with. We're friends with them and we trust them. They're pretty much of the same mentality that everyone else has been.<br /><br /><b>I know the <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/dale-crover.html" target="_blank">Melvins</a> got a load of socks and suits from Volcom when they did their record. Did you get anything cool? Did you go for a trolley dash around the warehouse?</b><br />A: That's exactly what we did!<br />S: They cut me off! They cut me off because I took too much stuff.<br />A: When we first signed on with them it was like "OK, cool, we better do some business-y stuff", but then - they have a factory store in Costa Mesa - they just went "OK, take what you want, go crazy".<br />S: We had to ship stuff home. We were on tour at the time, and there was just so much stuff.<br />A: We grabbed fuck-ton of stuff. Jeans, socks, shirts, bags, luggage, hats, headphones, underwear, belts, sunglasses, towels...<br />S: We were broke, and most of the clothes I was wearing were so old, that I just got me this huge bag, like <i>this</i> tall. Like $300 worth. The bag itself, I mean. The bag was about $300, and I filled it. It was like a shopping spree. You put a bunch of broke motherfuckers in there and tell them to go crazy?<br />A: By the time we were done they were like "Uh, OK. I think we should go now". We had these three <i>huge</i> boxes.<br />S: We had a pile, about the size of this room.<b></b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-oUK_nLPu7Cg/UJvMpqxRpKI/AAAAAAAAAR8/dZqYJBXEBbU/s1600/TorcheNov2011CLR-193-Copeland%255B1%255D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-oUK_nLPu7Cg/UJvMpqxRpKI/AAAAAAAAAR8/dZqYJBXEBbU/s320/TorcheNov2011CLR-193-Copeland%255B1%255D.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Photograph by Gary Copelan<b>d</b></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><b>&nbsp;</b> </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>What do you think of the UK?</b></div>R: I love it. People seem really excited that we make the trip to come out, so as long as people are excited, we're more than psyched to be here. It's been two years since the last time we were out here, so I feel that with these shows, the reaction from the crowd has been awesome. everybody's super cool. I like the vibe. Especially after touring the States so many times in the last couple of years - it's refreshing.<br />A: During the day is cool too, you get to walk around and see some shit you'd never normally see. Like Nottingham Castle.<br /><br /><b>It's been four years since your last album. What have you been doing?</b><br />S: Every year we've put out something. We did the Songs For Singles EP, we did the Boris split, we did the Part Chimp split last year. Basically we spent last year writing this record. And recording it. And then it took six months or something to get it out. And we tour a lot. In order for us to make a living we have to stay on the road. This time we took a lot of time off in order to write the record, and between recording the record and having the record released we were just sitting at home, and working regular jobs.<br /><br /><b>Is the band your day jobs now?</b><br />A: I want it to be. I'm not good at working in retail. I mean I can do it, I just don't <i>care</i>. I care about this, I don't care about that.<br /><b><br />I see you've got some XXXL shirts. Where do you sell those?</b><br />A: <i>(Immediately)</i> In the US.<br />R: It's an American thing because there's a lot of fat-ass people in America. Occasionally you'll get a ghetto-fabulous dude who wants to rock a XXXL t-shirt, you know? Out to the nightclub or whatever. So you gotta have that too.<br />S: Or some little tiny girl what wants it as a nightshirt. Any time we don't have them, there's always a bunch of people like "You don't have XXXL? What the hell?!"<br />A: Only when you don't have them, there'll be some massive dude who's 6'8" and 350lbs, going "Aw, dude..."<br />R: They're fat here too though...<br /><br /><b>But people are ugly here! And drunk. I'd rather have fat people than ugly, drunk people everywhere.</b><br />R: Hahaha! Oh, man...<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/dxPWP-qjlV8?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>You make a point of declaring that you're not a metal band. Can you explain this?</b> <b>In what way are you not a metal band?</b><br />S: We're a band that's influenced by metal as well as punk, and rock and Middle-Eastern music. We don't think like metalheads.<br />A: We're just a hard rock band.<br />R: A very open-minded hard rock band. I think bands like Bauhaus and Swans are some of the heaviest shit ever, and they're not metal bands.<br />S: I love stuff that's influenced by Hüsker Dü, but I love eighties metal and thrash - stuff I grew up on. I grew up listening to Sabbath and Priest and Maiden and all that, then in the mid-eighties I got into thrash. A lot of the San Fransisco Bay Area thrash bands, then the whole rise of the underground and Florida death metal. Then in about '88 I started venturing off and listening to different things. After Clandestine by Entombed I was like "Everything great has been done". In metal. For me. There are bands <i>now</i>, like High On Fire, and that's the kind of metal I like. Really raw, powerful metal.<br />A: The new High On Fire record is, to me, a fuckin' masterpiece. Dude it's so good, it's just so right. It's super powerful, and it's kind of meathead-ish without being stupid.<br />S: The drums sound unbelievable. They sound like a fucking locomotive. Or if you're riding a wooden rollercoaster. It's like DOOF DOOF DOOF DOOF.<br />R: It's cool when you hear a recording of them, and they're playing metal, but it doesn't sound like they went to the same studio that every other metal band went to, and had the same drum preset triggered in on their drum kit, and the same guitar tone... It's unique. It sounds like <i>them</i>. It has room to breathe, it's not prog-y for the sake of being technical, you know?<br />S: That's what killed metal for me.<br />R: It's a pissing contest. It's "Look how complicated we can be" but that shit's just not brutal anymore. You don't want to hear this brutal song then all of a sudden this guitar solo comes in and it's this beautiful thing, with all these sweeps, and all that shit.<br /><b><br />Who else is doing metal right just now?</b> <b>You did that split with Boris, do you consider them to be a metal band?</b><br />R: No way. I think they're a total rock band. They're an interesting band too, they're kinda like the Melvins, they're a band that can do anything they want to do. It's never the same thing. You can tell someone to check out Boris and they'll pick up one of the drone records, and they'll be "What the hell is this?!"<br />A: I think we're all of a similar mentality. We're all influenced by the Melvins. I saw the Melvins in like '91, and they had the power of a punk band, and they were just heavier than any band I'd ever heard - part from Swans of Godflesh or something like that - as far as a rock band, they were so fuckin' heavy. They changed everything for me. You can be heavy without having this strict black and white. There's this huge grey area in what they do. And with what we do. A lot of our newer stuff is kind of Krautrock-y<br />S: Very driving, very repetitive, very psychedelic. It's all over the board, but still sounds like us.<b></b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/s7uokNi7qEw?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Is this change a reflection of the things you've been listening to more recently?</b><br />S: Just trying different things, and just progressing as a band.<br />A: It's about keeping yourself excited as well. There are certain bands who can do formulaic stuff really well, like AC/DC are still just crushing faces all around the world. It's the obvious example, but when you're writing songs and playing live you do it to please yourself.<br />R: We haven't changed that much as a band. The production's changed, and maybe the songwriting slightly, but we haven't changed as much as people make out. People are like "Oh, you guys have turned into a total pop band now" but we were kind of a total pop band before.<br />A: When people say that, I'm like "You didn't hear that from the beginning?!' It's always been there.<br />S: You're damned if you do and damned if you don't. People want you to write the same record over and over again, but then when you do, they're like "Aw, it's the same thing!" But we've been pretty lucky to have such a dedicated fan base. Everyone has a different favourite record, which is cool. We don't want to be one of these bands that writes the same record over and over.<br /><b><br />Like Mogwai...</b><br />A: It's a similar vibe. I don't know what their MO is, but maybe they're still trying to perfect a certain ideal, and they want to try it again, and try it again. Some of the reviews for our new record were all "It's cool, but it's just the same" and some were "It's cool, but shit's totally changed".<br />S: Vice magazine said we'd changed too much, then Pitchfork said we hadn't changed enough.<br /><br /><b>What's the best band you've played live with?</b><br />S: Harvey Milk is one.<br />A: Big Business.<br />R: Part Chimp. Boris. We've been lucky, we've toured with a load of great bands.<br />A: We toured with Jesu.<br /><br /><b>Volcom had a <a href="http://forums.sidewalkmag.com/showthread.php/16532-Best-name-for-a-Metal-Band-With-a-Mastodon-Valient-Thorr-prize!" target="_blank">'Name a Metal Band' competition on the Sidewalk forum</a>. What do you think of some of these? <i>(I show the band the list)</i></b><br />R: 'Necropaedophilia'? Is that fucking dead children? Jesus, God...<br />A: 'Haha! 'Endoscope Periscope'!<br />S: I like 'Rectal Suffocation'... 'Dangerwankk Mumfukk'! 'Pout at the Devil'! Hahahaha! Oh, God... 'Frozen Mammoth', 'Stillborn Grandma', 'Chainmail Sexbeast'? Haha... 'inFANTASYde', that's clever. 'Cradle of Milf'! Haha!<br />A: 'Prison Jism Power Shower'! Dude... That can be Steve's side project. Those are <i>fucking</i> amazing. This is so good.<br /><i>(A member of venue staff comes in, and immediately leaves)</i><br />A: He was offended.<b></b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="http://2.gvt0.com/vi/70e8_dUvYzI/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/70e8_dUvYzI&fs=1&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/70e8_dUvYzI&fs=1&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b>What did you listen to in the van today?</b><br />R: The Chameleons today. Trans Am.<br />S: Rectal Suffocation...<br />A: Amps For Christ, Psychic TV...<br />R: Godflesh. It's all over the place. Japanese noise punk - Attack SS<br />S: Cock Sparrer, Black Flag, Deicide...<br /><b><br />Do any of you skate?</b><br />R: Absolutely. I don't skate so much now, what with all the touring and stuff... I'm just scared of hurting myself now actually. I kinda had to stop when I broke my finger. I broke my finger and I realised I couldn't play. There were a couple of dudes down in Florida when I was growing up that used to skate for Element, so they'd always have product in the trunk. That was how I used to get a lot of my stuff. It's hard for me to not get on a skateboard and mess around when somebody has one, but I just can't right now. If I hurt myself I'm out of work.<br /><br /><b>What two musicians would you like to see fight each other?</b><br />R: I want to see Dale Bozzio kick the shit out of Lady Gaga.<br /><br /><b>They're both men, anyway...</b><br />S: Haha!<br />A: Aw, dude! Dale's awesome. Lady Gaga <i>sucks</i>.<br />S: I think just Madonna and Lady Gaga would be satisfactory. I just want to see Lady Gaga get the shit beat out of her. I feel I want to see a lot of musicians get the shit kicked out of them, by anyone. I want to see a bunch a metalcore bands fight each other and kill each other off. I hate those flat-ironed haircuts.<br /><b><br />What's the best non-musical thing you've bought on eBay?</b><br />S: I don't think I've ever bought anything on eBay that wasn't music related.<br />R: 'The Orkly Kid', with Crispin Glover in it, on VHS.<br />A: I collect - when I have money - old tobacco pipes. It's the most Spinal Tap shit ever. You can buy them all crusty and beat up, and I'm pretty good at fixing them up, and making them look new-ish. Then you sell them and make money. I had fifty or so before I moved from Atlanta to St. Louis. Made a bit of loot...<br /><br /><b>Torche are recording a new album for Volcom this Winter, for a late 2013 release, and are touring Europe again in June.</b>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2012/11/torche.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-4574246702958399922Mon, 08 Oct 2012 18:23:00 +00002012-10-08T11:25:34.280-07:0039 Rad Balloons - A Skate Video Music Mix<div><object height="480" width="480"><param name="movie" value="//www.mixcloud.com/media/swf/player/mixcloudLoader.swf?feed=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mixcloud.com%2FFingersMcNeill%2F39-rad-balloons%2F&embed_uuid=f4fb0448-04a3-4e9d-a90c-e310030095c7&stylecolor=&embed_type=widget_standard"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="wmode" value="opaque"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="//www.mixcloud.com/media/swf/player/mixcloudLoader.swf?feed=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mixcloud.com%2FFingersMcNeill%2F39-rad-balloons%2F&embed_uuid=f4fb0448-04a3-4e9d-a90c-e310030095c7&stylecolor=&embed_type=widget_standard" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="opaque" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="480"></embed></object><br /><div style="clear: both; height: 3px;"></div><div style="color: #999999; display: block; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0; padding: 3px 4px;"><a href="http://www.mixcloud.com/FingersMcNeill/39-rad-balloons/?utm_source=widget&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=base_links&amp;utm_term=resource_link" style="color: #02a0c7; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">39 Rad Balloons</a> by <a href="http://www.mixcloud.com/FingersMcNeill/?utm_source=widget&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=base_links&amp;utm_term=profile_link" style="color: #02a0c7; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Fingersmcneill</a> on <a href="http://www.mixcloud.com/?utm_source=widget&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=base_links&amp;utm_term=homepage_link" style="color: #02a0c7; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank"> Mixcloud</a></div><div style="color: #999999; display: block; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0; padding: 3px 4px;"><br /></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">I made a mix of some of my favourite tracks from skate videos.</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Jason Lee - Freestyle (Blind, Video Days)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Archers of Loaf - Lowest Part is Free! (Dan Wolfe, Eastern Exposure 3)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Danzig - Mother (Zero, Thrill Of It All)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Tortoise - Tin Cans and Twine (Stereo, Tincan Folklore)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Fugazi - Waiting Room (Big Brother, Shit)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">McRad - Tom Groholski (Not actually in a video, as far as I know)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Kirk and The Jerks - To Be A Hero (H-Street, Hokus Pokus)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Beastie Boys - So Whatcha Want (Blockhead, Debbie Does Blockhead) </span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Casual - Me O Mi O (Plan B, Second Hand Smoke)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Sizzla - Haunted and Nervous (TWS, Sight Unseen)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Diamond D - Best Kept Secret (New Deal, Whatever)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Method Man - Bring The Pain (World Industries, 20 Shot Sequence)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Nena - 99 Luftballoons (Blind section, Trilogy)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Earthless - Jull (Emerica, Stay Gold)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Bad Brains - I (Toy Machine, Brainwash)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Beastie Boys - Time For Livin' (Plan B, Questionable)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Mike Ternasky and DJ Dek - Am Rap (H-Street, Hokus Pokus)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Sub Society - The Isolator (H-Street, Next Generation)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Bob Dorough - Three Is A Magic Number (Girl, Mouse)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">De La Soul - Keepin' The Faith (FTC, Finally)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zeroes - Home (Lakai, Am I Am)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Morrissey - Speedway (Alien Workshop, Mindfield)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Black Sabbath - Killing Yourself To Live (XYZ, Stars and Bars)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Iggy and The Stooges - I Wanna Be Your Dog (Flip, Sorry)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Milk - The Knife Song (Blind, Video Days)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">David Bowie - Panic In Detroit (101, Falling Down)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Tommy Wright III - On Da Creep (Palace, Tres Trill)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Sebadoh - It's So Hard To Fall In Love (Foundation, Art Bars, Subtitles and Seagulls)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Stereo Total - Movie Star (Alex Craig, H'min Bam)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Ice and The Iced - We've Had Enough (88, Destroy Everything Now)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Althea and Donna - Uptown Top Ranking (FTC, Penal Code 100A)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Daniel Johnston - Casper (Justin Pierce (RIP), Kids)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">The Pastels - Nothing To Be Done (Chris Mulhern, This Time Tomorrow)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">New Order - Age Of Consent (Osiris, Subject To Change)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">The Odd Numbers - Little Kings and Queens (New Deal, Useless Wooden Toys)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Rites of Spring - For Want Of (TWS, Transmission 7)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Ish Marquez - Gin Is Not My Friend (Landscape, Horizons)</span></div><div style="display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 3px 4px;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Dinosaur - Little Ethnic Song (Lots of Alien Workshop videos)</span></div><div style="clear: both; height: 3px;"></div></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2012/10/39-rad-balloons-skate-video-music-mix.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-7577238848433716653Wed, 03 Oct 2012 11:04:00 +00002013-04-24T05:00:47.201-07:00GirlJ CassanovaJereme RogersSelfishJereme Rogers<div class="ajy"><b>BITE MY WIRE, your top-selling skateboard gossip monthly, was able to negotiate this WORLD EXCLUSIVE print interview with the HOTTEST new rap talent on the block - the enigma that is JEREME 'J. CASSANOVA' ROGERS! Jereme spoke candidly to our man, revealing his innermost thoughts, from personal philosophy to his sleazy secrets as a bed-hopping SEX ADDICT! We get the scoop on Jereme's SENSATIONAL move into music, how it is to OWN his own company and his remarkable REFUSAL to retire from professional skateboarding after his SHOCKING split from Girl!</b></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-KLOcBl1AnUM/UGbUR0aYr8I/AAAAAAAAAQs/F-hWD3zV9XE/s1600/Jereme1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-KLOcBl1AnUM/UGbUR0aYr8I/AAAAAAAAAQs/F-hWD3zV9XE/s320/Jereme1.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><b>How are you finding it being a musician, a pro skateboarder and a company owner?</b><br />I eat, though I am not an eater. I talk, though I am not a talker. I am not what I do, nor confined to what I do. I am a human being. At the core, I am formless... Skateboarding, music and good business are just some of the few things I do as a human. My strength and identity is inside and comes from nothing external.<br /><br /><b>Hip-hop's coming back into skateboarding. It was all shitty indie rock for a while, but now people are skating to hip-hop again. Obviously there's Lil Wayne putting his rap career on hold to skate. How do you think this change came about? You were kinda ahead of that.</b><br />First off, thank you... Secondly, change always comes about. I have definitely noticed skateboarders more openly claiming to make music, rapping, etc. I was definitely the first from skating to actually openly pursue music so head on with the ambition I did... But if anything, what I wish is that all things I do to inspire in man, is freedom from fear.<b></b><br /><b><br /></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/Su99AryJUmM?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>What's the longest you've gone without stepping on a skateboard since you started?</b><br />One year. When I retired in June of 2009, I didn't skate once or even own a board until the following June, 2010.<br /><br /><b>What's the longest you've gone without fucking a girl?</b><br />It's been a while... I don't fuck anymore, I make love. That does not mean that it's slow with candles lit every time, or that there must be wedding vows or commitments, but that it is pure; an act of Love. There's married men who've never made love to their wife. The only difference in the act, is the internal experience, whether one is viewing their partner in a derogatory fashion, or purely; with Love. One leaves you feeling unfulfilled, the other; inspired.<br /><br /><b>Do you ever fuck the same girl twice?</b><br />I have, but naturally this question is slightly cancelled out by my last answer.<br /><br /><b>What was the first album you owned? Do you still like it?</b><br />It was a Memphis Bleek album that I won mixed in with some other stuff at a skate contest. And no. Hahaha!<b> </b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-RqTNwgqAJBU/UGbWwthocQI/AAAAAAAAAQ8/kCuTkkshqk4/s1600/jeremerogersspider.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-RqTNwgqAJBU/UGbWwthocQI/AAAAAAAAAQ8/kCuTkkshqk4/s640/jeremerogersspider.jpg" width="304" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Picture by <a href="http://littleliedown.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Andy Smoke</a>. </span><b><br /></b></div><br /><b>Do you go to shows?</b><br />I've been to some, but definitely don't make it a point to go.<br /><b><br />People look at stuff in the street and think about how good it'd be to skate. Do you check out which rooftops would be good for getting naked on?</b><br />It's the only way to do it right.<br /><b><br />Who do you want to do a song with? Have you asked them? Anybody cool asked you to work with them?</b><br />Everybody good, no, and yes... But I'm gonna work with everybody I want. I'm in control of my destiny as much as a man has ever been.<br /><br /><b>Would you be happy for some people to see you as a skateboarder, and for some people to see you as an artist? Or should everybody appreciate that you're both?</b><br />There's nothing that everybody should, only things that everybody could, and I would be happiest if people saw me as I am. But vision is clouded by fear, and opened by Love. People can only see me as they see themselves. It takes doubt in self to doubt someone else; love of self, to love anyone else; and hate in self, to hate anyone else. All starts with self, and ends with everyone else.<br /><br /><b>Which gets you most girls?</b><br />Freedom... Freedom from fear attracts all humans, men and women alike.<br /><br /><b>You're smarter than a lot of people think. Does it depress you to see some of the reactions to stuff you do? Or do you do stuff to wind people up?</b><br />Nothing outside of me has power over what's inside of me. If you let external circumstances affect the state of your internal life, you'll have no power over your external life. Internal power is the leading cause of external power. You must first feel you are, before you are... If you let what's outside of you have any effect on what you feel you are, you'll never be what you want. By saying "You made me upset" - or made me anything, you're forfeiting your power over self, and giving that power to someone else.<br /><br /><b>What's Pink Dolphin? Nobody in the UK knows what that is.</b><br />I don't either, it's just some brand that gave me free clothes and I wore them over dirty ones.<br /><br /><b>Who else do you think would be a good fit on Selfish?</b><br />I don't... I think little, plan less. I live in the moment; present. What matters most is feeling, and my thoughts are aligned with my feelings. When someone feels right, it will be because they are.<br /><br /><b>Why did Selfish go to France, and not the UK?</b><br />I've been to the UK, more than once I believe...I've filled three passports. My travel exploits are quite a blur, all of which I'm grateful for and have had a positive effect on my internal make up.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/Nv32onsjaeE?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>What set up do you use for making music?</b><br />Pro Tools... Industry standard shit<br /><br /><b>How long does it take you to make a track?</b><br />One sitting, whether it takes 30 minutes, or several hours, it's still done in one sitting. I come back to tracks for mixing and tracking, but never for vocals or writing, that's all done in one sitting or not done at all. And I don't actually write, I let it come to me naturally... It never sees the light of day on a pad or phone or any other place outside of my own mind.<br /><br /><b>How much music are you sitting on? Is there going to be a J. Cassanova album?</b><br />Of course. I'm always steps ahead of whatever content I got out. That's just how it goes for anyone who wishes to continue doing what they're doing. You must remain ahead of what you're perceived as or they'll stop caring to make any perceptions of you at all.<br /><br /><b>Did you ever prank call a shop and pretend you were your own soundboard?</b><br />No, but I did listen to some of the prank calls made with it, and all bias-ness aside, they were thoroughly entertaining.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CQmZwTKsNVA/UGbUZ8gsX2I/AAAAAAAAAQ0/JlLPgRx31K8/s1600/Jereme2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CQmZwTKsNVA/UGbUZ8gsX2I/AAAAAAAAAQ0/JlLPgRx31K8/s320/Jereme2.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><br /><b>Why did you say you weren't getting royalties from Girl?</b><br />I was getting my cheque, just not my actual royalties. I got a three thousand dollar guarantee a month, which operated as a minimum; meaning I get that no matter what, but if I sell over the minimum, I get the extras - royalties kick in. Thing is, everyone on the brand got that same minimum, I believe on Chocolate as well. But everybody wasn't breaking that minimum, which means it costs them money... Which is wrote off as marketing costs. Though some of us were breaking it, myself being one of them. Zumiez (big U.S. skateboard chain-retailer) told me I was one of their top three sellers for years. So what had happened was, they were letting my royalties fall back into the company to cover their overhead, which helped keep a boat afloat that had some leaks. For two years I apparently didn't break my three thousand dollar minimum, yet Zumiez alone - who I was a top three seller for those same two years - had over three hundred stores in the U.S. If I sold ten boards a month to each of their three hundred locations - which is not a lot of boards for one of their top three sellers to move each month in a mall shop - then that would equate for six thousand dollars a month at two dollars a board, just off Zumiez. Don't forget, we're taking about Girl here who sells all around the world. So clearing a three thousand dollar minimum was not an issue. I was rookie of the year that year, 2006... I was also the highest rank street skater. Yet somehow, I was still not clearing my, what was at the time, measly minimum. So I inappropriately blurted out at Tampa 2007, after getting second to Koston, who had a flawed run, against mine which was flawless, that all I wanted was my royalties, when Rick Howard asked what I wanted after doing so well. The following month I got a six thousand dollar cheque... The first time I broke my three thousand dollar minimum, "apparently", and on top of that, it was April; tax time. Coincidence... Sure.<br /><br /><b>How much do you pay your team?</b><br />We give them double the industry standard... Which is two dollars a board. We give them four.<br /><br /><b>I heard you lurk on a certain skateboard forum... Would that be right?</b><br />I don't lurk. I don't kill time, I cherish it. But God bless you guys, I hope the forum is awesome, and I will gladly read every comment after this to see what you magnificent humans have to say.<br /><br /><b>Can people send you beats?</b><br />People can do whatever they want if they apply the right mind, principles, and passion to it.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://gentlemanlyconduct.blogspot.co.uk/" target="_blank">Jon Horner</a> made this into a brilliant comic.<span style="font-size: x-small;"> See the full-size version <a href="http://littleliedown.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/word-around-town.jpg" target="_blank">here</a>.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://gentlemanlyconduct.blogspot.co.uk/" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-CbaNJlScyRI/UXfIIGGyBCI/AAAAAAAAAU8/a7pYlNCpMCE/s640/Word+Around+Town.bmp" width="463" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">&nbsp;<span style="font-size: x-small;">Cheers for doing this Jereme. Massive thanks also to the brilliant Andy Smoke and Jon Horner for the illustration and the comic. Andy drew Jereme's last Selfish graphic, and loads more of his work can be found on his blog, <a href="http://littleliedown.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">here</a>. Jon draws all sorts of amazing things, and his blog can be found <a href="http://gentlemanlyconduct.blogspot.co.uk/" target="_blank">here</a>.</span></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2012/10/bite-my-wire-your-top-selling.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-1140376953969631582Fri, 24 Aug 2012 23:51:00 +00002012-09-13T08:38:53.137-07:00BrushfireDanny GarciaDonovaneSFTCHabitatJack JohnsonMatt CostaMogwaiTony DouganDanny Garcia and Matt Costa<b>Pro-skateboarding guitarist and friend of this column, Danny Garcia, was recently in the UK to record an album with his friend Matt Costa (and half of of Belle and Sebastian) at <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/mogwai.html" target="_blank">Mogwai</a>'s Castle of Doom studio. Matt's signed to Jack Johnson's Brushfire label, and while he gets used to playing bigger and bigger shows, Danny is finding ways to split his time between skateboarding and musicianship. I caught up with the two of them to talk about music, skateboarding and life.</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-r-sxtOqZd-w/UDe_PUs1UEI/AAAAAAAAAP0/suRfhQcAkAE/s1600/dannyandmatt1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="261" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-r-sxtOqZd-w/UDe_PUs1UEI/AAAAAAAAAP0/suRfhQcAkAE/s400/dannyandmatt1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Danny Garcia and Matt Costa, Glasgow, 2012. Photograph by James Anderson</span></div><br /><b>So what are you up to?<br clear="all" /></b>D: It's Matt's record. It's pretty much fully his thing. He lined it up, and figured it all out, and just invited me out. We've been out here for a couple of weeks. We went to Amsterdam, for a week, just to hang out, then hit it here.<br /><br /><b>Amsterdam can be cool if you avoid the centre.</b><br />D: It was crazy. We didn't know it was 'Queen's Day' out there. It's basically their big national holiday. The reputation is that you can do whatever you want in the street, but one this one day people go <i>really</i> crazy. It's packed, and everybody's fucked up. It's pretty interesting! We were gonna leave that day, and we couldn't leave, because you can't move around.<br /><br /><b>How do you two know each other?</b><br />M: Through Raymond.<br />D: Yeah, through Raymond Molinar.<br />M: Raymond would always show me stuff that Danny was working on, and he'd be all "Yeah, Danny, he's pretty good", and then we ended up being in the same place at the same time and we just sorta got along, and gradually started hanging out.<br /><br /><b>Is this the first time you guys have played together?</b><br />M: The last record that I'd done was the first time we'd done any playing and recording together. Actually, we played together with Mothers' Sons, a band Danny was in. They're not together any more.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/2fckfszdLrs?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Why did you come all the way to Scotland to record?</b><br />D: Matt talked to a load of different producers. I think he talked to the guy who works with the Flaming Lips in upstate New York or something, and he knows Tony <i>(Dougan)</i>, so he passed the songs over to him. He thought Tony would dig it, and that it'd work out.<br /><br /><b>It's a long way to come. It must be expensive to stay here, just because it's where one producer is.</b><br />D: Yeah... I think when you get into it, that's the thing though. You get the opportunity to be somewhere else and work with different musicians.<b> </b>We're recording with a few of the guys from Belle and Sebastian - Bob <i>(Kildea)</i>, Stevie <i>(Jackson)</i> and Chris <i>(Geddes)</i><b> </b>are playing too. Matt's a big fan of the music that's come out of this area. He's a big Donovan fan.<br /><br /><b>Donovan was born in Glasgow, but I don't think many Glaswegians think of him when they talk about Glasgow musicians.</b><br />D: Maybe Bert Jansch?<br /><b><br />Yeah, more so. I think Bert Jansch fits with what people think of as Glaswegian music more.</b> <b>But anyway, are you going to be touring this record with Matt?</b><br />D: Probably. For the last couple of years it's been pretty easy for me to get in when I want, and get out when I need to.<br /><br /><b>So it suits your skateboarding?</b><br />D: Yeah. It's kind of the other way around. I make music to suit the skateboarding. But I've been concentrating on music more lately.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Vl1Vw3NcaAI/UDfAYsM7_oI/AAAAAAAAAQE/QdYyIB1z2M4/s1600/dannyandmatt3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="260" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Vl1Vw3NcaAI/UDfAYsM7_oI/AAAAAAAAAQE/QdYyIB1z2M4/s400/dannyandmatt3.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-size: x-small;">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Danny Garcia and Matt Costa, Glasgow 2012. Photograph by James Anderson</span><br /><br /><b>Your Habitat shoe is out. Does that mean you're gonna have to be deep into skateboarding as soon as you go back?</b><br />D: The Habitat thing was pretty easy. I had a conversation with Joe Castrucci, and I said I didn't want to go crazy with it, and skateboard all day every day... I mean I skateboard every day, but I mean more like doing the whole thing, playing the game, although I still want to be a part of it it. Basically the conversation went, "We'll give you a shoe, and here's the very minimal list of things you have to do", you know? They're not going to pay me a bunch of money, it was a minimal agreement. Which was nice, because that's why I did it. And because I had left éS to free up my time.<br /><b><br />So you'd left </b><b>éS before 'the announcement'?</b><br />D: Yeah. I didn't know if they were gonna can it or not.<br /><br /><b>So had it been discussed?</b><br />D: Yeah... I dunno, I think they were probably struggling, but I always hear that - that companies are struggling. So you never know what's gonna happen. So I'd left to free up that time, and when Joe asked about the shoes I was like "Nah, I feel pretty good right now, where I'm at". But then... Not that he talked me into it! But he kinda talked me into it. And it's Habitat, so it's kinda the same sponsor I've had all these years. It's not a weird shift, or some shock to get used to new people or anything. It was easy.<br /><br /><b>Easy to skate for your board sponsor's shoe division.</b><br />D: Yeah, I'd just dealt with them before. You start stacking up sponsors, and then you have like four or five jobs. Not like it's crazy, but you're dealing with four or five different groups of people, and you have different responsibilities to them, and sometimes they get in the way of each other. It's always been easy riding for Habitat. I've always been off on my own thing, you know?<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="http://0.gvt0.com/vi/rGkS_Qk685g/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/rGkS_Qk685g&fs=1&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/rGkS_Qk685g&fs=1&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b>What did you think about the reasons behind why Sole Tech pulled the plug on éS, and about Nike and adidas being in skateboarding?</b><br />D: It's interesting. I don't <i>know</i> what to think about that. It's kind of happening now, that shift, into those big brands. I don't know if I like the idea of it, but it seems to be happening nonetheless. I think you can keep peeling the layers back, and find positives and negatives about it. There's multiple sides to that coin. They're supporting a lot of good skateboarders, and keeping them in the game, keeping them around. It's a difficult one.<br /><br /><b>So you left éS without a shoe sponsor to go to.</b> <b>Was that not difficult?</b><br />D: No, it was kinda nice. I wanted to make time to tour, and just play music. I just wanted a little bit of time for myself, and financially I was able to get by. It's nice to get those pay cheques and things, but I'd gotten them for a few years. I wasn't completely well-off, but I was able to get by.<br /><br /><b>Talking of money, do you predict changes at Habitat now that Dyrdek's bought DNA?</b><br />D: I don't know. I wonder. I just had a conversation with Joe, and he said something about how it's back to Carter, Hill and Dyrdek. I think it'll still be a year or so before they fully transfer the thing over. I don't even understand how these things work, or how much change there's going to be. I didn't notice any change when Burton came in, you know? I'm kind of detached anyway. I think it's cool though. I'm backing the story. It's a good story. And I like Dyrdek, so it's alright.<br /><b><br />Matt, you're signed to Brushfire Records, which is Jack Johnson's label. How did that come about?</b> <b>He's pretty big.</b><br />M: I met him through Emmett Malloy, who does music videos and films. More music videos, really, but he did some surf films too. They wanted to use one of my songs for the soundtrack to one of their films, which led them to hear more of my music, and then they asked me if I wanted to go on tour. At the time I didn't know what I was getting into, because I didn't know we'd be going and playing these huge outdoor shows. I didn't know how big he was. So anyway, it was after that that he asked if I'd want to put the record out through their label. Up until then I'd just planned to put stuff out on my own. I'd even put it out myself, independently. Before that I'd just done local shows around LA, around Orange County. But it afforded me so much opportunity. Which is what you want when you're making music, but you never expect it to happen. <br />D: Was the label new?<br />M: It was relatively new. It was maybe a year or two old. They've expanded a bit since then, they have a load of different artists now.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/waSNawdFUFI?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>What's your background in skateboarding?</b><br />M: Oh man... I started skating in Florida, when I was about twelve. Eventually I moved out to Huntington Beach which - at the time - was like the Mecca. It was at the time when the park was there, so it was like the meeting point for the whole world. I ended up meeting a lot of people, and I <i>wanted</i> to get sponsored and do the whole thing, and I guess I did. I worked my way through some different sponsors, and filmed a bunch and everything. I think I even met Danny at the Brea park, around by his house...<br />D: For some reason I thought we first crossed passed at that gap...<br />M: What gap?<br />D: In San Diego, the parking lot to parking lot one. Maybe it wasn't.<br />M: The big one?<br />D: Yeah, the big one. Have you never been there?<br />M: Yeah, I've been there. Maybe we did. I don't remember. So anyway, I just wanted to skate a lot. I dropped out of school to skate, and it kinda kept me out of trouble. I eventually broke my leg skating, so I couldn't skate any more.<br /><b><br />More time to play the guitar?</b><br />M: Yeah... I'd gotten an electric guitar when I was twelve as well, and when I moved to Huntington and was skating a bunch I actually ended up trading my guitar to Brian Sumner for a pair of shoes and a board, 'cause he wanted to learn how to play guitar. The shoes and the board lasted about two weeks... When I finally broke my leg he'd been playing a bunch and he'd got a nicer guitar. Mine was just a janky Japanese guitar, and the frets would fall out if you got too high up. So it was kinda useless. But when I broke my leg, he'd call me up and ask me over to show him how to play certain songs. I think, randomly, he gave that guitar to Jim Greco, and it ended up somewhere, God knows where.<br />D: It probably ended up at the Whiskey A-Go-Go.<br /><br /><b>In pieces.</b><br />M: In pieces, or burned or something. But yeah. Of all people.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/qpwiRfJuaKQ?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Is there a tour planned for this album? Is that something the label would deal with?<br /> </b>M: Touring and stuff is more at my end, with my manager and stuff. It's up to us to sort that out, but it is much easier when the label's there to help with promotion, and to let people know that you have a record out. That you exist. There's no tour planned, but it's in the works. I didn't get a chance to travel to the UK with the last record. It'd be nice to do that this time, especially since we made the record here.<br /><br /><b>If you could have a band made entirely of skateboarders, who would be in it?</b><br />D: Based on the music or the skating?!<br /><br /><b>Based on the music! So you can't just say "Cardiel on drums" or whatever.</b><br />M: Ha! It could be fun, if it wasn't based on the music...<br /><br /><b>But look at, say, Blacktop Project. Or 'Blktop Project', as they're actually called.</b><br />D: Who's that?<br /><b><br />It's <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/tommy-guerrero.html" target="_blank">Tommy Guerrero</a>, Ray Barbee, Matt Rodriguez and <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/chuck-treece.html" target="_blank">Chuck Treece</a>. And they're awesome.</b><br />D: Ah, that's their thing? I didn't know that's what they'd called it. Those are some of the guys that are pretty awesome. Umm... Stefan Janoski can play. He's a pretty creative guy. He plays the same way he skates. He just tries it, and just stumbles into being good. He played a little bit when I was staying with him in Sacramento, and I was like "Just buy a guitar!" He'd kinda mess around with my guitar but we went one day and got him a guitar. He's pretty good. Raymond can play. I'm just naming the Habitat team for you! I don't know Leo Romero that well, but he plays music.<br />M: I know Don <i>(Nguyen)</i> has a full rock band, they put something out.<br />D: Don, really? I know Ethan Fowler can play, of course.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="http://1.gvt0.com/vi/PSR4_LAPAaE/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/PSR4_LAPAaE&fs=1&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/PSR4_LAPAaE&fs=1&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b>L'il Wayne or J. Cassanova?</b><br />D: <i>(Immediately)</i> L'il Wayne. Do you know who J. Cassanova is?<br />M: No, I don't know who that is.<br />D: Jereme Rodgers. It's like his rap pseudonym.<br />M: Oh, man. I'm not up to date.<br /><br /><b>It's so bad you could almost believe it was a joke. If it was somebody else, you might believe he was... I mean, you might think it was a pastiche.</b><br />M: Were you about to say "taking the piss", but you didn't? You adjusted it for the Americans.<br /><br /><b>Ha! Yeah.</b><br />D: The music's pretty screwed.<br /><br /><b>TNT or Rob Welsh?</b><br />D: I'd go Rob Welsh. From years ago, I was into that, Mad Circle and everything.<br />M: "There's panhandlers in the street", from that Mad Circle thing. He was doing this whole Kerouac thing. That was rad. Remember the screen was all green, it looked like night vision or something?<br />D: What, in 411?<br />M: Yeah, it was the Industry section. With Justin Gerard in it.<br /><b><br />Talking of something like Mad Circle, what companies just now do you think are doing things right?</b><br />D: I don't pay too much attention to stuff like that... Slave, I like that. Not so much the company, but some of the artwork's pretty cool. Some of the Roger stuff's cool, I like some of their riders. It's cool how they splice together all the video clips. It's a kinda Workshop vibe.<br /><br /><b>Timecode.</b><br />D: Timecode.<br />M: There's a Vonnegut short story that springs to mind. A story in Welcome to the Monkey House. Sorry I can't elaborate any more than that!<br /><br /><b>Hieroglyphics or Gang Starr?</b><br />M: Oh, Hieroglyphics. But they're close.<br />D: I think I listen to Gang Starr more. But yeah, it's close.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yo-Sb1z1hfg/UDfAVt4FzfI/AAAAAAAAAP8/YM_bicnMpIg/s1600/dannyandmatt2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="262" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yo-Sb1z1hfg/UDfAVt4FzfI/AAAAAAAAAP8/YM_bicnMpIg/s400/dannyandmatt2.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">&nbsp;Matt Costa and Danny Garcia, Glasgow 2012. Photograph by James Anderson</span><b><br /></b></div><br /><b>What skate videos do you think have really benefited from the music? Or are there any where the music ruined it?</b> <b>Like the Rhythm video, maybe...</b><br />D: Yeah, that's the one that popped into my head. But it's funny, because now that I'm 'in' skateboarding, you can be biased towards certain things but when that video came out I was totally fine with it. I was just a fan, and I don't think I latched onto the music, but I still didn't question it. <i>(FTC's)</i> Penal Code is a reference for great music. That turned me on to a load of stuff. But the Rhythm video, it hung around - we're talking about it now, you know? You either want to be offending somebody or pleasing somebody. Maybe you need to go either hard left or hard right.<br /><br /><b>I thought it was weird at the time, but at the same time I figured they had a reason to do that, and therefore it must be the right thing to do.</b><br />D: Yeah, it doesn't always have to agree with you. Skateboarding's so abstract that you sometimes forget you can do whatever you want. Even <i>on</i> a skateboard. But it's human nature that you create these walls, and these rules, almost to a <i>pinpoint</i> where it's like, "This is it." I might not agree with it, but I don't mind widening those rules, and opening it up a little bit.<br /><b><br />Everybody just skates to indie now.</b><br />D: Yeah. It's just... Rock. And even <i>on</i> your skateboard. Not that I'm backing it, or that I would do it, but it's funny that you just <i>can't </i>push mongo. It's just an unwritten rule. These rules are just kind of created out of the air.<br /><br /><b>Or like 360 flips, if your back foot's too far off, then you're doing it wrong.</b><br />D: Yeah, you're wrong! There's tons of rules like that,<br />M: Going back to what we were saying, I think a by-product of Penal Code was kids listening to their parents' record collections. They had two Procul Harum songs, right?<br /><b><br />Yeah, 'Conquistador' and 'Whiter Shade of Pale'.</b><br />M: And Van Morrison. That was how I found out about 'And It Stoned Me', because I was looking for 'Caravan'. I went through my dad's records and I found that. The first time I heard 'Domino' was in an old Sophisto video. It was the first video I bought.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/Quvxnp-5GZc?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>That was Andy Howell's company?</b><br />M: I don't know... Jamie Thomas was on them, and I think Drake Jones was on 'em. They had that 'Get Thy Bearings' song on the video too, way before it was on Reynolds' part in the Baker video. I thought that was, like, a reggae song! Eventually when I got that record, 'Hurdy Gurdy Man', I was like "Holy shit, this is that song!" and I freaked out.<br /><br /><b>Plan B videos were good for music. Like the Steve Miller Band in Virtual Reality, that was rad.</b><br />D: Plan B got me turned on to Cream. Jeremy Wray in Second Hand Smoke.<br />M: It's a crazy one, but Aerosmith for Rodney Mullen! I remember <i>loving</i> that!<br /><b><br />Why do you think that people are so pedestrian with their music choices these days?</b><br />D: It's hard now because everybody has to pay for everything. It's trickier to get what you want. Video makers these days can't even get half way with it. It's just "Shit, we can't use Cream". Even if they have permission, they're just scared to do it. These big companies like Nike are so scared of lawsuits. Even if it was agreed they'd need signatures, they'd need pictures of the artist signing it... They're so scared to do it that it's not worth it. Like, "Who cares if it's a good song? We just don't want to get sued".<b><br /> <br />You skated to a Françoise Hardy song in one of the Habitat Field Logs. Are you a fan?</b> <b>Are you a fan of any music that people might consider '<a href="http://duroastbeefaouchy.blogspot.co.uk/" target="_blank">exotic</a>'?</b><br />D: I didn't choose that song, I didn't know we were gonna do that. But I listen to a lot of British stuff, sixties British stuff, and a lot of American stuff, and a little bit of South American. The Brazilian Tropicalia thing.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/p9P1UakveVI?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>You're South American.</b><br />D: I was born in California, but my Mom was born in Peru, yeah.<br /><br /><b>Is there any music you love that you'd never skate to?</b><br />D: Probably most of the music I listen to. I've never been able to have the ability to hear songs in the skateboard video context. I don't think like a video editor, things just appeal to me sonically. Most of the music I like wouldn't be proper for skating.<br /><br /><b>John Lennon or Jim Morrison?</b><br />M: John Lennon.<br />D: John Lennon. I never got into Jim Morrison. It's cool, but I never got down with it.<br /><br /><b>Sonic Youth or The Sonics?</b><br />M: I don't even really know The Sonics.<br />D: The Sonics are a garage band, sort of like a 'Nuggets' band. I never really got into Sonic Youth.<br />M: I'd say Sonic Youth, because I've heard of them. Just from Ed Templeton.<br /><br /><b>What do you guys think of composed music for skate videos? Obviously there was the <a href="http://bitemywire.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/baron.html" target="_blank">Flip video</a>, but it goes back to Mr. Dibbs doing the music for the Habitat section in Photosynthesis.</b> <b>Do you think there's a future in that?</b><br />D: Yeah, why not? Especially if it was skaters. I've even talked about doing it. It'd be fun to really do it. I've never gotten the chance to make music for a video, it's always just the case that you get a call one day before they need it. If you're a skateboarder who is a musician, and understands a little bit about the video thing, it might be interesting to see. If they took it seriously and had time.<br /><br /><b>You skated to one of your own tracks in a shoe ad, didn't you?</b><br />D: Yeah. But once again, everything that's ever been in a video, they needed it so quick. Usually I don't even 'do' it, I just find something that I've recorded already. I've never actually had an opportunity to actually spend time with it and think about it.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="http://1.gvt0.com/vi/Yjc7L_TOP60/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/Yjc7L_TOP60&fs=1&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/Yjc7L_TOP60&fs=1&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b>Do you think there's too much music available, on things like Soundcloud? It was much easier to be selective with MySpace.</b><br />M: Yeah, but I think the ratio of good and bad is still going to be the same, because it's still humans making it. There's always going to be taste, and there's always going to be reaction to things that are popular, or other things that have been done. The idea of what constitutes 'music' is the same thing that makes humans human. It's something that comes from us. Even if it's just pushing a button or something.<br /><br /><b>Do you think there's more of a nobility to being a musician than to being a skateboarder?</b> <b>A lot of people would.</b><br />D: Like it's a hierarchy? No, I don't think so. Maybe it's more romantic. But it's the same thing. You're just playing with a toy, you know? That's really it. You're trying to create something out of this piece of wood, and people connect to it, and that's why they'll back you. Somehow they connect to it because they do the same thing. Who knows? It's a funny idea when you step back and look at it.<br />M: For me, personally - yes. I remember skating with people who were just really natural at it, and I always felt I had to work extra hard to do some things that maybe someone could learn in a day. As far as songs go, I feel a lot more comfortable doing it.<br /><br /><b>Skateboarding's dangerous, and it's hard. Do you think that's an equivalent value to the emotion that goes into writing a song?</b><br />M: Obviously there's an artistic side to skateboarding, but it's more of a physical strain than music. Physically, you could be really dexterous and play lots of crazy scales, but writing songs takes a much more introverted approach than skateboarding. I find that anyway. But there are so many parallels. It has a different validity to each individual. I definitely have less anxiety when I'm about to write a song compared to rolling up to a handrail!<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/6O9GoqsvuA8?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>But being signed to a label is similar to filming for a section. Now people are expecting something good from you.</b><br />M: Oh yeah. The expectations are always being raised.<br />D: It's internal stuff. It's always made up by yourself. You kind of give yourself those pressures. It's nice to do that, but I find the with the people who are a little more carefree, it comes out more naturally. Delivering something with less anxiety seems to be a little bit nicer. More natural.<br /><b><br />So how does the satisfaction vary between writing a song and learning a new trick?</b><br />D: It kinda is the same thing. It's that funny sense of accomplishment. I don't know why the hell I strive for it. Most of us need a little bit of that every day, whatever it is we do. I get the same feeling if there's a big load of dishes and I finish the dishes. I just feel that I can go to sleep at night and feel comfortable. It's the slight obsessive compulsive thing that everyone has. I little amount is healthy, a crazy amount not so much.<br /><b><br />It's a healthy thing to have if you're a musician or a skateboarder. When you need to discipline yourself to get stuff done.</b><br />D: That's the thing. I've seen it in people where it's so too much. If you're <i>so</i> obsessed with making music where you stay in all day, it's like being in jail. There's a certain point where I feel bad for people who are so obsessive, because they're kind of imprisoned in that obsession.<br /><br /><b>Danny, do you see yourself - at the moment - as a professional musician?</b><br />D: I don't know. I don't think so. Trying to make a living off it is kinda tricky. Any time I'm doing something like this, I'm paying for it. I spend a lot of money, you know?<b> </b>Skateboarding kinda allows me to do it. I could do it, but I don't know if it could be a living. I mean, that's a living for a really small amount of people.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Do you think you will, eventually?</b><br />D: It's kinda hard. I don't know. I mean, I could do. I don't have any ties, you know? I'm single, I don't have a family, so as far as going out on the road, I could do that. To make it as a musician you have to <i>constantly</i> do that. It just depends if you could be away most of the year. I guess I could do it for a little bit.<br /><br /><b>But you were just talking about the parallel between being a professional musician and a professional skateboarder. Would that not make the transition easier?</b><br />D: Yeah, maybe. Maybe with the lifestyle. Yeah, it's really similar, so it's just a matter of if I want to do it. Maybe that's why I find myself playing with the idea, and being here, experiencing it. I'm benefiting from my skateboarding, which allowed me to do it; and benefiting from being able to do it because of my friend doing it. It's the experience that I'm comin' after.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/QPIeacg8Rcs?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>What things inspire you to make music, besides music?</b><br />M: One thing I'll say, is that when I was growing up, watching skate videos, that was the first time I actually 'placed' music with movement. I think that spending so much time watching sound and motion together played a lot into how - when I started writing - it was more of a visual thing than it was an aggressive thing, or whatever. I was always going to this visual place for it. I think that had an impact on why I started songwriting.<br /><br /><b>A visual sound...</b><br />M: Yeah. That was the goal.<br />D: I've never thought about it like that. For me it's the feeling of accomplishment, the need to get something done, day-to-day, and feeling kinda good for the day. Not just to get it done and out the way, but to feel good about something. Almost posterity too, for some reason. To log these things, and have 'em. Just like how you would take a picture.<br /><br /><b>That's the skateboard mentality talking.</b><br />D: Yeah. I would go out and shoot a photo, just because it felt good and it would put me in a good mood.<br />M: It makes your place on the Earth feel worthwhile for a little bit longer.<br />D: Because we're humans, everybody's doing something all day. Pecking away at something, whatever the hell it is. Everyone's got their own version, but that's my version.<br /><br /><b>The basic need to create and evolve.</b><br />D: Yeah, that's it. Especially to kind of pass along some sort of tradition. And to live longer. We all know we're going to die, so in a weird way, I think that informs the way we act sometimes. We're going to die <i>fairly</i> soon, so in a weird way you're always trying to live a little bit longer by fuckin' painting on walls or things like that. Trying to communicate longer.<br />M: For me it's almost like a barometer of who I am. Like I'm getting to know myself every day. Placing yourself and gauging yourself. If I don't have it I almost have a self-crisis. I need it to reflect myself, almost like a mirror. Even just to know how far you've come. It's the closest thing to perceiving yourself from the outside, and a lot of times it helps you learn what you need to improve about yourself in other parts of your life. Interpersonally, or maybe things about yourself that you've neglected in the past.<br />D: Gaining perspective, and being able to look at yourself objectively. <br /><br /><b>Who inspires you musically?</b><br />D: There's been a lot, and it changes over the years.<br />M: I like Dando Shaft a lot. I've been listening to them a lot lately. We're gonna go see some Chopin today.<br />D: I get into stuff sonically, like the way things sound, and sometimes I get into songwriters. Sometimes you just get into the attitude of something. It's usually American music of the last hundred years. That's what I always go back to.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/Ta4gcmcyK5c?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><b><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></b><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><b><span style="font-size: small;">Danny's solo album - as Reverend Baron - is available on <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-music&amp;field-keywords=Reverend+Baron" target="_blank">Amazon</a>, iTunes and Spotify right now, and it's great.</span></b></span><br /><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">&nbsp;Thanks to Danny and Matt for the drinks. See you guys next time. Massive thanks to James at <a href="http://www.northcolour.com/" target="_blank">North Colour </a>for taking the photos.</span></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2012/08/danny-garcia-and-matt-costa.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-6454078500977923484Wed, 08 Aug 2012 08:22:00 +00002012-08-08T13:48:46.947-07:00Dagger PathsForest SwordsMatt BarnesOlde English Spelling BeeForest Swords<b>This one-man project from the Wirral has constructed one of the finest records the UK underground has heard for a while - imagine Burial crossed with the Velvet Underground, crossed with Seefeel crossed with Lee Perry, crossed with Ennio Morricone and produced by Timbaland, and you're getting close. Dagger Paths <i>(out on Olde English Spelling Bee)</i> is a record of shuddering psychedelic hip-hop/dub/drone, made from processed guitars and bass, fragmented vocal samples, dubbed-out drones and analogue celluloid atmospheres. It's a widescreen vision of an indefinably bleak-yet-lovely late night Britain, and I think, one of the few indispensable records of recent years. My friend Roddy and I grabbed Matt Barnes after he finished one of his rare gigs.</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-9WzF4Za3amY/UCIWPgeSTUI/AAAAAAAAAPM/s7VHc3MZW3M/s1600/Forest+Swords.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-9WzF4Za3amY/UCIWPgeSTUI/AAAAAAAAAPM/s7VHc3MZW3M/s320/Forest+Swords.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><b>N: You've just played to a sold-out Stereo, despite being signed to a tiny label and having had virtually no press. How did that come about?</b><br />I dunno, I guess a lot of it's word of mouth. People just find out about it through YouTube and stuff like that, or they'll see my name on the bill and just stream it and decide to come along. Obviously it depends who you clash with, but it's incredibly flattering - I've never been to Glasgow before, and you never know what to expect, or to expect from a crowd. I'd maybe know what to expect from Liverpool or Manchester, but to come this far up and get a response like that is just amazing. I've not really played live before, so I guess that's why people are maybe curious about it. I had a kind of year off last year, because I had some hearing problems, so I couldn't make any new music or play any shows. It's maybe snowballed a bit.<br /><br /><b>N: You've not had a record out for a while.</b><br />Yeah, not for about eighteen months.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/UgYOcWh8G5E?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>R: I bought the Rattling Cage 7", and it was expensive, it was eight quid or something. Then it was his birthday, so I had to give it to him. I went back to buy it and it was only on eBay, and it was twenty-five quid. That was just in a couple of days.</b><br />It's crazy. It's hard to explain without sounding like a dick, but maybe it just connects with people in different ways. In different ways to how people normally discover bands. It's maybe that it's just this different vibe, this different energy that people engage with.<br /><br /><b>R: I used to listen to a lot of ambient stuff when I was younger, but it seems like what you do is miss out all the bits that aren't really necessary.</b><br />That's really interesting. I agree with that. I went to art school in Liverpool, and did a degree in design, and the <i>first thing</i> we got taught was that everything you do has to have its own place, and justify its own place, within what ever you do. So it makes what you do more articulate. If something isn't necessary, you take it out. Because you can't justify it being there if it serves no purpose. You have to strip it down to the bare bones of what it has to be.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="http://0.gvt0.com/vi/_xl3XqjWmbQ/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/_xl3XqjWmbQ&fs=1&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/_xl3XqjWmbQ&fs=1&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></div><br /><b>N: Is your music a hobby?</b><br />Yeah, I've got a day job.<br /><br /><b>N: Which is?</b><br />You won't believe this. I design the Celtic magazine. <br /><br /><b>R: No way</b>!<br />I went to the Celtic shop before, and I was totally geeking out. We publish it down in Liverpool. They write it up here, but we design it in Liverpool. That's my job. Because of that I know everything about Celtic - I know fuck all about any other football team, but I could tell you anything about Celtic.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-16aIENJRiik/UCIgTREY9nI/AAAAAAAAAPg/KqaRYPSBC2Y/s1600/FS_PROMO.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-16aIENJRiik/UCIgTREY9nI/AAAAAAAAAPg/KqaRYPSBC2Y/s320/FS_PROMO.jpg" width="248" /></a></div><br /><b>N: Do you sit down with the intention of writing a tune, or do they just come together?</b><br />I kind of play around with riffs and beats and stuff, and it's just a case of layering it, and seeing what works. It's just all layers.<br /><b><br />R: We'd first heard of you through a skateboard forum. This guy from a place called Cumbernauld posted the Miarches video.</b><br />Oh, wow! You see, that's crazy to me. That's an example of word of mouth I guess. The internet just diminishes everything, so you don't need to make so much of an effort to find out about stuff.<br /><b></b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/xAW7vypqUJM?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>N: What do you listen to yourself?</b><br />I listen to a lot of hip-hop. I listen to hip-hop radio stations so it just kind of seeps in. Old stuff's brilliant, but I like the production on the current stuff. It's quite pop-y, but if you listen to the sounds, there's these weird things that sometimes get through. It's very over-thought, whereas early hip-hop is a lot freer. It goes back to what we were saying before - it's articulate. There's no bullshit. Stuff like Ennio Morricone too. It's weird too, I was saying to my friend, there's a lot of Glasgow bands I grew up with. A lot of Chemikal Underground bands. A lot of electronic music. Lots of Kraftwerk.<b> </b>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2012/08/forest-swords.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-6935592431485668341Mon, 06 Aug 2012 18:38:00 +00002012-08-08T13:44:30.408-07:00Beta BandDjango DjangoJam CityNight SlugsDjango Django<b>With their outstanding debut album appearing seemingly from nowhere earlier this year (only two super-low key singles preceded it), Django Django have recently embarked on a tour of much bigger venues than any 'new' band might expect to - and it seems that translating their avant psyche/indie/kosmiche/drone/</b><b>te<wbr></wbr>chno pop from its beginnings in drummer Dave's bedroom to 1,000 capacity venues hasn't been a problem, because they're absolutely killing it live right now. Dave and singer/guitarist Vinny gave us their time.</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5_-q_F2mWPg/UCALH_9H-NI/AAAAAAAAAO4/T9l2o7F6zDI/s1600/dd.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5_-q_F2mWPg/UCALH_9H-NI/AAAAAAAAAO4/T9l2o7F6zDI/s320/dd.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Django Django. Photograph by Mikael Gregorsky.</span></div><br /><b>The tracks 'WOR' and 'Storm' have been around for ages - they were both singles a while ago and have been up on YouTube for a couple of years. What have you been doing in the meantime?</b><br />D: Loads of stuff. I had to finish the post-grad I was doing at Chelsea Art College, Vinny was busy being an architect... Trying to make money. The weird thing was, we put out 'Storm' and 'Love's Dart' on this little Glasgow label called Shadazz in 2009, and we had no more music. We didn't have a band, or anything.<br /><br /><b>Those were your only songs?</b><br />D: We maybe had three or four, but they were so rough, and we just weren't ready. After we did that we were just like, "Shit, what do we do now?" We did 'WOR' to sort of bridge the gap while we were learning to be a band.<br /><br /><b>You make it sound like it isn't a significant part of the album!</b><br />D: No, no, no! It's still my favourite track, and it's one that people love live. But we had to literally hide away, and make an album, become a band and get a record label. Then when we did finish it we had to get it mixed, and that took ages...<br />V: ...and then there's the whole marketing thing, like when it should be released, and it was released eight months after we delivered it. But we did most of it at Dave's flat. We didn't want it to sound lo-fi, so there was a lot of learning to be done. We were trying to get good production values in terms of the equipment we had, which was next to nothing. It took so much longer than when you go into a production suite, and there's mics here, here and here, when the guy just mics it up and you're ready to go. It was kind of the opposite of how you'd have done it in the eighties or nineties where you'd build up loads of songs and play loads of crappy bars and just gig for years and get really tight; then an A&amp;R guy spots you and you're ready to go. It was the opposite for us. We were trying to catch up with ourselves.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/mvOiFmjExx4?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>So did you have a supreme amount of faith in the album, to know that you could go away and make it yourself, and then just appear with it?</b><br />D: No, I think it was more that we just took one step at a time.<br />V: We kind of just went along with the knowledge that there wasn't much heat on us. That's what it felt like anyway. It gave us the space to keep going with it. Obviously when we did 'Storm' it created a bit of a buzz, and that kind of spurred us on to do more. Each new thing kind of geared you up for the next stage. It took us about a year to get the live set-up going, to be able to interpret the songs, because there's a lot of layers and they're quite complex. How do we represent that on a stage, with four people, when potentially you've got 150 layers on a track, you know? To pick the key things, then make that work was the hard part.<br />D: We're probably quite stubborn. We thought "Well, if we like it, then that's all that matters". With every track, we just thought "Does it reach our standard?" And then we had an album we liked, and we thought that was a good enough start. It was good to have a label that let us do it the way we wanted to, and do it in the flat rather than put us in with some super-producer or something.<br />V: They came in at the right time, because we had the album almost done.<br /><br /><b>Who produced it?</b><br />V: Dave.<br />D: Yeah, I produced it, and then we mixed it in a proper studio with a huge outboard mixing desk and echo rooms and stuff like that. That just brought it up another level.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/JQGTORbJgB4?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Was it a big move going from making an album in Dave's flat to playing in front of thousands of people, with nothing in between?</b><br />V: I think our heads were so stuck in it we almost lost sight of what was happening. It's like if you're writing a novel, your friends eventually stop asking you how the book's going, and it gets quite claustrophobic.<br /><br /><b>You get lost in it?</b><br />V: I think so, yeah. And you've heard it so many times, because you're always tweaking things in the recordings. You might have heard a track 1,500 times, and you can't make a critical judgement on it anymore. Obviously it's been really great how it's been received, but we'd have been happy with a lower level, like a 'cult buzz'. Our aspirations were quite low.<br />D: Yeah, it's kind of smashed my expectations. I mean I hoped that people would like it, because we spent so long on it, and we really put everything into it. We just hoped that people would 'get it'. I didn't think it would break out like this, and be played on the radio, and us do gigs this big... I thought that maybe that would come some day, after three albums, but I never thought it'd be today. It's great. I guess we feel that we've just slowly built up and built up, so I feel that we're kind of ready for it now. I think that if we'd done the album earlier and then been thrust into this situation we'd be "Oh, shit!" But it's nice, everything's come at the right time for us. It's been good.<br /><br /><b>Is it your day jobs now?</b><br />V: Yeah.<br />D: Yeah. For this year anyway. Which is good, because it was a nightmare to try to work 'round jobs. This whole year is dedicated to touring, and we're going to Australia, America and Japan. You can't expect to keep your job!<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/DDjpOrlfh0Y?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Have recent changes in technology - with the downfall of MySpace and stuff like Spotify getting massive during the time that you've existed as a band - changed the way you approach making music, or approach marketing?<br /></b>D: I think MySpace totally revolutionised the music industry, and it became clear to us that when you put four tracks up on MySpace, you've released an EP. Whether you like it or not. People will take those recordings and copy them, burn them, share then and put them on CDs. We soon found out that that's it - you've released music to the world - and I think that's great. It made everything really fresh for bands. It was exciting.<br />V: It was great that it by-passed all the formal routes people take to make music.<br />D: And it took ten minutes. You didn't have to wait for anything. You could put a song up in the morning and then by the evening you had a load of comments and feedback. People have got to move with technology. I'm a stubborn vinyl-head - I never moved to CD, and MP3s are beyond me a bit - but I don't think it matters how you consume music. It's a personal thing.<br /><b><br />But does it affect how you make music? Were you writing for a 'side A' and a 'side B'? </b><br />D: Not necessarily two sides, but definitely 'an album', rather than just tracks to be put up here and there. But that's probably from growing up, from listening to The Beatles, and Neil Young, and Pink Floyd - proper albums. We wanted to do it like that, even subconsciously. As I say, I only buy vinyl, but you can't tell 15 year-old kids to go and get a record player or they'll think you're mad. To be honest I think most music consumption now is done through YouTube. I do that myself too. If I'm going for a shower I'll put on an album, or a mixtape on YouTube.<br /><br /><b>It was the first opportunity for a lot of people to hear your music.</b><br />D: Yeah. I think for as much music as we're into, whether it's dance or hip-hop or whatever, I guess we are in an 'indie' bracket, and you're not going to go down to <i>(legendary London dance music retailer)</i> Black Market Records and ask for a dubplate of us. You've got to be out there on blogs. I think blogs and SoundCloud are the record shops now, I think that's where people get fresh stuff. I won't DJ music unless I've got it on vinyl, and it's becoming more and more difficult because stuff doesn't appear on vinyl so much.<br /><br /><b>So it was an easy decision to have the album released on vinyl?</b><br />D: Yeah. We would never have signed to a label that weren't into doing vinyl.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/T2dOW3ztvfs?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>What was your musical upbringing? What bands brought your individual outlooks together?</b><br />D: I guess we were all into sixties psychedelic stuff,&nbsp; from our parents' record collections. Pink Floyd, The Beatles, Love, Bob Dylan... When I was eight or nine I was digging around in those, just discovering the classics really.<br /><br /><b>That isn't really stuff that's reflected in the music you do now though.</b><br />D: I think it's there, deep in it somewhere.<br />V:&nbsp; I think that's the foundation, maybe, that you build everything else on. I suppose like most people with a healthy musical outlook we were open to new stuff. Like you meet guys who are 50, and they were into punk, but now they listen to some post-dubstep stuff or something. It's great when you meet people like that, who aren't stuck in 'their' era.<br /><br /><b>So what new stuff are you digging then?</b><br />D: For me, Night Slugs stuff. Jam City. This new breed of house, Pearson Sound. It's this mish-mash of dubstep and UK garage, mixed with classic house. I mean, my first love was hip-hop. I discovered Public Enemy and spent my youth DJing hip-hop, and then jungle. I think that after the jungle scene I started getting into anything and everything, and just started buying loads of reggae and calypso. I think the two things that have stayed with me throughout my record collection are hip-hop and house. Chicago house, like Relief Records and Dance Mania.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/Xs5sEaYGNBU?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>I think that's reflected in your production.</b><br />D: Well that's what I was doing before I met Vinny. I was sending tapes away to Trax records. I've always had this obsession with certain sounds of Chicago house, and I think now that kids are discovering that music again. In Jam City you can hear stuff like Wax Master Maurice or Boo Williams, those guys who were making - at the time - this mad, new, out-there music, and I remember first getting Boo Williams stuff on Relief and thinking "This is house, but it's nuts". It wasn't like anything I'd heard, and I get that when I hear some of that Night Slugs stuff. It's almost avant garde, and it shouldn't work. That excites me. Clone Records as well, from Rotterdam - the Jack For Daze stuff is really good.<br /><br /><b>In the way that you got to this warped version of house through Chicago house, do you think that people buying your record will get switched on to weirder stuff?</b><br />D: Maybe. We post up a lot of weird music that people might not expect that we're into. People might be baffled and hate it, but I think it's what keeps us <i>us, </i>you know? I mean,&nbsp; I was making house, Vinny was writing songs and we fused those together. On 'Waveforms', the rhythm for that was for a dancehall record that Daddy Freddy was on that I did in Edinburgh years ago, and I just took the beat and it became 'Waveforms'. It's like the psychedelic indie pop, then you've got this bashment thing, and it works. So there's bits that have just fed in, but I wouldn't want it to sound like a guy who makes house meeting a guy who writes songs. It's got to sound like Aphrodite's Child, where you've got Demis Roussos, and you've got psychedelic rock. It's got to merge and become one sound. And sort of transcend genres, because I think the best rock, or pop, or indie breaks out of being just that. That was something that I always hoped we'd be able to do.<br /><b><br />You're kind of in the deep end now, basically starting out playing to big audiences. What live music have you seen in your lives that's inspired you?</b><br />D: Well, my brother was in the Beta Band, so watching them was always a bit "Fucking hell!" You could hear stuff like Public Enemy in their music. I think that that's what keeps us at a parallel with them. We get compared to them a lot because we're not just into one thing. Watching videos of Public Enemy and De La Soul was a big thing when I was a kid. I had this skate video called 'Attack', and it was one of the first skate videos I remember seeing, and it had this fantastic, breakbeat, bombastic soundtrack...<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/QbPMjpoJXtU?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Bomb The Bass.</b><br />D: It was Bomb The Bass. I don't know if you know a skateboarder called Gordon Dear, a Fife guy..? Goosho? I grew up skating with him, in the Factory in Dundee, and we got hold of this 'Attack' video. I asked Gordon what the soundtrack was, and he said "I'm pretty sure it's Public Enemy", so I went with my mum to Our Price and I got 'Fear of a Black Planet' on tape, and got it home, and it wasn't the music from the video. Because that was Bomb The Bass, but I was just hooked then, completely drawn in. I'd only ever heard The Beatles, and my parents' record collection, until then. It was like "Fucking hell! This is NOW!" It was bands like that who got me excited about wanting to make music.<br />V: It was probably the Beastie Boys for me. I saw them about five or six times. I saw them at Lollapalooza in Chicago when I was 15 - I'd never been out of Derry before - and it was in this massive arena. That summer, they'd just done 'Ill Communication', and it was all over MTV. I was watching MTV a lot out there, because we didn't have it at home, and then to see them was totally mind-blowing. Where I was from, there was no hip-hop around, so it opened this new channel. I went to see them every time I could after that.<br /><br /><b>Have you had time to think about what you're going to do next? New album?</b><br />D: New album. Trying to think about how we're going to approach the sound of it. I think this album was like a lifetime of musical influence, just sort of puked out.<br />V: Very slowly.<br />D: Yeah, puked out very slowly! Dribbled out over three years.<br /><b><br />So you'd describe your album as 'dribbled puke'?</b><br />D: Haha! Yeah. The next one's going to be projectile vomit!<br /><br /><b>You're obliged now to have a 'difficult second album' anyway.</b><br />V: It's good in a way, because I don't think we're cornered. Sometimes that can happen if a band have a very particular sound, and you think how they'll go from there. Our album kind of leaves the door open for us to do whatever.<br />D: As much as we ever try to think about it, I know we'll sit down to make it, and it'll come out totally in its own. I think when we try and make music it's like a beast that takes on its own form and it feels like we've created a monster half the time. I think our only philosophy is that we just go with it, and let it happen.<br />V: Go with the accidents. Loads of the things we've done on this were kind of flukes, or accidents. Like you'll put the drum machine on, and it's at the wrong speed for the song, and you play with it anyway, and it goes somewhere else...<br /><b><br />So you can't really approach it the way you did the first one?</b><br />D: I think that would take too long now. I don't hink we'll have that time. We've got our live heads on now anyway, trying to be a live band that people can come and see, and hopefully think it lived up to something.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/Ny67ABAGKh4?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Why are you called Django Django?</b> <b>I heard it's got nothing to do with the jazz guitarist...</b><br />D: Yeah. We wanted something like Liquid Liquid, or Duran Duran... More Liquid Liquid! We were looking around the room, literally going through doubles of everything in the room, and there was a rave record called 'Son of Django' - I guess named after the Western, although I never knew that - and it just became Django Django. It was just me and Vinny sitting with a MySpace account, and we'd never have thought we'd be sitting having made an album, talking to you now, waiting to play ABC1 with the name Django Django! We were probably pissed, after work. I asked Andy from the Phantom Band what he thought, and he said it was the worst name he'd ever heard. That was good enough for us. Although I think they were called Tower of Girls at the time, which is a great name.<br /><br /><b>It's a better name than the Phantom Band.</b> <b>Anyway, thanks for not spelling your name with triangles instead of 'A's.</b><br />V: Haha!<br />D: Haha! Yeah. A 'D' and a 'J' is hard enough. DJ Ango DJ Ango...<b> </b>http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2012/08/django-django.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-1005802061758787794Thu, 05 Jul 2012 08:44:00 +00002013-02-02T02:42:24.836-08:00CommonDrag CityLaetitia SadierMonadeNurse With WoundSam PrekopSilencioStereolabTim GaneLaetitia Sadier<b>Laetitia Sadier founded Stereolab - with Tim Gane - way back in 1990, and for the next nineteen years (the group announced an 'indefinite hiatus' in 2009) helped introduced post-rock, krautrock, 60s European pop and experimental indie to countless enthusiastic pop-kids and moody musos alike, via their beautiful, hypnotic, analogue future-pop. Modernist and vintage, sophisticated and shimmering; Stereolab - with their swirling grooves and motorik rhythms - were a very special band. When the band stopped, multi-instrumentalist and vocalist Laetitia carried on making music, and exactly the kind of music we would hope for, considering her role in the band. Following a short time with her own group - Monade - she's now onto her second solo album and it was with some pleasure we were able to interview her. <i>Silencio</i> is out on July 24th, on Drag City.</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-UExUdhGYZYo/T_VP0xFU-GI/AAAAAAAAAOg/KN6Z-tiX6nU/s1600/dc440ph06.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="250" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-UExUdhGYZYo/T_VP0xFU-GI/AAAAAAAAAOg/KN6Z-tiX6nU/s320/dc440ph06.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><b>It almost seems like you're working in reverse. You were in a band who owned their own label, and now you're solo - and signed to a label. Is it easier to create knowing that somebody else is looking after the business side of things, or does it feel like an obligation to create for somebody else?</b><br />I don't know. That's a tough question. Like "Why?" and "Who do I do this for?" I certainly don't do this for a label. I don't even know what force it is that makes me do things! I guess it's a love of music, and wanting to express myself, but there's an evolution. There are different reasons each time, I guess. With each record you're somewhere different, and there are different motivations. It's complex and almost paradoxical at the same time I guess, because when I write, I write for myself. I write what I want to hear and what wants to come out, and I don't worry about who's going to hear it. I did wonder at some stage, I wondered what Tim would think - if it was corny or something! I'm freeing myself from that worry now, and it's very liberating because he probably doesn't care that much. If you start worrying about what people think, you won't do it. There's kind of this universal law of physics; there's always going to be someone who likes it and someone who doesn't. I don't worry about it, but at the same time it's about doing your best and showing your most authentic, sincere side. It's about relevance, whether a personal relevance or a societal relevance. And those aren't opposed. And I think that's what my work is about.<br /><b><br />I agree. Especially this record. Do you see <i>Silencio</i> as a statement? It seems to be your most political record.</b><br />It is my most political record. 'Auscultation to the Nation' is the most overtly political track, and I didn't even write those lyrics.<br /><br /><b>Yeah, what is that? A translation of some rant by somebody?</b><br />It was on a phone-in show. It's a very political programme, and at the moment it really looks at the economy, and the forces of work within it. The stuff that you're <i>never</i> going to hear on the news - it's a big plot. Without being a conspiracy theorist.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/uHtAFdTROeE?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Do you think the new French Socialist government is going to be an improvement?</b><br />No. No. They're going to have to find a political way of explaining to people that their wages are going to be lowered. They support the system, they're neo-liberalists. All their advisors are very dubious guys. No Marxists advisors. They want to carry on the system of debt, so that some financial markets can buy the debt and sell it on at a profit. It's completely nuts. This government, the new Francois Hollande government, is in support of this system, and always has been. If people think they're going to get a different system they're wrong. They're going to get more of this system, and maybe the differences will be played-out with, say, how aggressive the police are. And they're very aggressive in France. I voted against Sarkozy so that possibly my friends over there could avoid going through some very fascist and forceful things that people have to go through every day. Every day there would be enormous abuse of power under Sarkozy. It's been like that for ten years, and Sarkozy's been in power for ten years, because not only was he President for the last five, but he was also Minister of the Interior for five years before that, and they're responsible for the police and such things. It was very clear under his rule how you ought to behave.<br /><b><br />With that in mind, was this an album that you sat down to write, or is it songs that you've been inspired to write at different times?</b><br />It's a funny question that, because at times I thought that I was sitting down to write an album, OK? It was in two batches. I sat down for four days between Christmas and New Year, and then there was another batch in February, for two weeks.<br /><br /><b>That's not long.</b><br />It wasn't much time, but that was when I realised I'd been collecting ideas for months, and I went through them. Without me realising it, I'd throw them onto Photo Booth, on my Mac - where you can record yourself - and I had all these little ideas, so all I had to do was turn them into songs. And that was the actual work I did. Then there was a song I'd been working on for about two months, completely alone, and that became 'Merci de M'avoir Donné la Vie'.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Xd5ZmUwacIc/T_VQyN-6hhI/AAAAAAAAAOo/BV5LloZQ1bc/s1600/LaetitiaSadier_byDavidThayer_04.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Xd5ZmUwacIc/T_VQyN-6hhI/AAAAAAAAAOo/BV5LloZQ1bc/s320/LaetitiaSadier_byDavidThayer_04.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><b>Does the available technology affect the creative process?</b><br />Hmmm... No. I think you still have to choose, and go with what you like. It's a complicated question, because when you record now, you can record a whole song on a train...<br /><b><br />So does that mean you end up with a greater body of work? Is there a massive editing process for you now?</b><br />No. That's not how I operate. I have very little waste. I use most of what I do. I don't have much lying about. I mean, I could write a song a day for a year and just keep the best ones for an album, but you see, I went to the Tim Gane school of music<b>. </b>He would only write what he needed to write.<b> </b>It's not like I'll write 75 songs, then work on 50, then record 35, and 25 will be on the record, two will be on the tour single, one will go there, two will go there... Conveyor belt. No.<b><br /> </b><b><br />Tell me about the near-silent track at the end of the album.</b> <b>Is that to separate the music from whatever else the listener hears next?</b><br />No, that's not how it was intended. I intended to put the silent track inside the record, but somehow it did not want to go inside, it wanted to go at the end. That's where it sounded best to me. Something I've learned, is that you might have an idea of something, and that idea might not work. If the idea doesn't work you can't force it. The track had to go where it wanted to go, because there's a natural order, a natural configuration for things. There's no use in being stubborn! The intention wasn't to separate anything, but at the same time, it was to have a breather.<br /><b><br />So it was intended more as a sonic element than as a psychological element?</b><br />Oh yes, very much.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZJPXldB9eG8?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Being able to re-arrange tracks sounds fun. Was it a fun record to make? It sounds like it was. Do you find it fun to make music?</b> <b>Is it easy for you?</b><br />Oh yes! I wouldn't say it was easy, but it gets easier with experience. What gets easier is choosing the right people to work with. That makes the task much easier, if it is people who work with their hearts, and then you can have a synergy going on. The first batch of songs, the 'Toulouse batch', I did with some French brothers and sisters. Some brothers and sisters that it took a long, long, long time to meet. It was more of a band, so I was more of a kind of orchestrator. We did four songs in four days. I'd written the songs, but they weren't necessarily arranged or anything. We didn't mix them, but we recorded them. Which is quite an exploit. It really came together quickly, because the were listening to what I was saying, and understanding what I was saying! It was hard work, but it was pleasurable. And it went somewhere that we liked. The second batch we recorded in Chicago, at my friend James Elkington's house, in his attic. He's a Brit, actually. You know how the British are. They're funny...<br /><b><br />Well, I'm Scottish...</b><br />Well you are British. You're not English, but you are British. Whether you like it or not. First of all you're Scottish - I can hear that - and that's the main thing, but you are British.<br /><b><br />OK. That's cool. So what about James then?</b><br />Well James is English. He's not Scottish. But he's really funny. We did have a really good laugh working together. It was fun to make and I'm glad that transpires.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/WzhTgCGrmqs?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Do you write music with certain musicians or engineers in mind?</b> <b>You've worked with some amazing people on your records.</b> <b>Like, say, Sam Prekop's on this album. He's got a very particular sound. Did you write parts knowing he'd be playing them?</b><br />No. No no no no no. You just write what you can. You write the song, then you see who's available, and who's willing. Then you have to ask people. I certainly don't have a 'final sound' when I write a song, I don't think it's possible. Maybe for some people who are really technical or something, but for me: no. I may have particular ideas. I was listening to David Axelrod, and you know how his music is so sculpted? It's not like "We''ll put the drums in, the bass in, the guitar in, the singing on top, and a bit of keyboard", it's like it's made of vibes, and there'll be a bass arriving, some strings arriving, and then BAH-BAH! Something else. And them maybe some crazy guitar. It's sculpted. So I though, "Oh, wow! I want to do something like that!" y'know? And that's how we started with Jim. It was track three, 'Silent Spot', and we just didn't want to use a click track or anything. It's very time-consuming to work like that, and I had twelve days to record seven tracks. It's a lot of work, and a day isn't very long when you're recording a track.<br /><b><br />To adopt an approach like that, do you find it an easier decision to make when you're making a solo album?</b><br />Yes. With Stereolab I didn't have anything to do with the music, which was incredibly frustrating! But it was clear - my territory was the lyrics and the singing. Full stop. Occasionally I'd be able to slip in a title or something. With Monade, it was my playground, it was my beginnings. My experimental ground. Some of it was solitary, some of it was with a group of friends. I think that what, today, really gives me the freedom to change my mind and to be myself is just the experience of Sterolab, the experience of Monade finally come to fruition whereby I can really listen to myself and have the confidence in what I create. Although it's not necessarily 'mine' in the sense that I own it, but I can guide it. I have more experience to guide it.<br /><b><br />In what way do you not own it? Is it because there's a band of musicians working with you?</b><br />I had this sensation when I gave birth to my son - that I'm <i>responsible</i> for my child but I don't <i>own</i> him. It's the same with my songs. OK, they come out of me, I create them, but I don't own them. The concept of ownership here, simply cannot apply. I'm responsible for them in that I have to make them as beautiful as I can on the record, and I have to go out and play them as well as I can, but I don't own them. They're not 'mine'.<br /><b><br />Do you have a favourite out of the people you've worked with? Anybody you'd especially like to work with?</b><br />I'd love to work with Jim again, I'd love to work with Richard Swift again, I'd love to work with my crew of lovely people in Toulouse again - they're very talented, very hard working and not ashamed of their ideas. Yuuki Matthews... Sometimes I think of people and then I forget... I'd like to work with Phoenix. I'd like to work with Erykah Badu. I think I would learn a lot from her.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/lv7ft9NKh7g?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>You worked with Common, didn't you?</b><br />Yes, I did do. I did. I recorded the tape at home in London, and sent it to him wherever, so it was all done via labels. I did meet him once. He rang me up. I wish I had been more awake at the time. I didn't like rap at the time, because I didn't know the good stuff - I didn't even know Common! But this guy was just so endearing, I couldn't say no. It was only later that I discovered how <i>good</i> he is! I didn't see that at the time. Silly me!<br /><b><br />At least you still agreed to do the track!</b><br />Yeah, but it was only because it was so impossible to say no!<br /><b><br />What about Nurse With Wound? Were you a fan of theirs before Stereolab collaborated with them?</b><br />Tim was. But I'm really a fan of that record we did together. I think it's really, really super.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/PMTXgCDMY98?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Is the stuff you recorded with Mouse on Mars ever going to see the light of day?</b><br />No. Not that I know of.<br /><b><br />Do you listen to any of your own music for entertainment?</b><br />No. No. But, actually, yesterday I was in the car with a friend and he had <i>(Stereolab compilation)</i> Fab Four Suture, and we played that. And it was quite entertaining. Not all tracks, but some tracks. But I don't. I should, because I'm so unaware of some of our records. Like, "What do they sound like with all this distance?" Not enough time!<br /><b><br />Do you use much of your equipment from previous records on the new stuff? Some of it sounds familiar, some of it sounds totally alien.</b><br />Good! I like to hear that. The singing, I guess, will be reminiscent of Stereolab. But yeah, we use an iPad. The iPad Moog app. And that sounds like an instrument in its own right, like nothing else. Not even the Moog itself. So I was really pleased to find a sound that was absolutely new.<br /><br /><b>Did you use a real Moog at all?</b> <b>Any analogue electronics on this record?</b><br />No. Well, the stuff that Sam Prekop did was analogue electronics, although I couldn't tell you any names. I don't know what he's got. All I know is that it's analogue, and it sounds really cool. Haha!<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/af0K6C4gn6U?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Is a solo career a new era for you, or is it an evolution?</b><br />Well, there was the Stereolab era, and that subsided, then the Monade era, which subsided, so I can't pretend it's not a new era because it is. At the same time it's a continuation. I don't feel that there was a radical abandonment of the past. It happened very naturally, actually. I thought I had finished as a musician when the band finished, but then I realised I'd been building this body of work that was like a house that could house me, and house more work. And thanks to facebook I got invited to play in Belgium, in Greece, in Portugal, Brazil, Chile... All of a sudden people were like "Hey, you wanna come and play?" So I was like "OK! I'll come and play. I'll knock something together and come and play!" So it was circumstantial as well as natural. When I recorded The Trip, I mean I never thought I'd make a solo record, but the publishing company gave me some money and said "Record your new album". I was like "What new album? Oh, a new album! OK!" Everything just fell into place. And I love it.<br /><b><br />Have Stereolab officially split? It was called an 'indefinite hiatus' at the time - is that still the case?</b><br />It's still an indefinite hiatus. But I'm not holding my breathe!<br /><br /><b>Sure, but it still isn't an official split?</b><br />Tim's too intelligent for that.<br /><br /><b>Does your son enjoy his parents' music?</b><br />Ah, it's a mystery. I think he secretly does.<br /><b><br />And doesn't admit it?</b><br />No!<br /><b><br />Is there anything you're listening to just now that you think fans of the music you do would like?</b><br />Ah... Shit... I'm listening to a beautiful record just now. It's a record that everyone who comes to my house wants to listen to, and a record that just seduces everybody who hears it. It's a record Elefant Records sent me, it's by Giorgio Tuma and it's called <i>In The Morning We'll Meet</i>. It's <i>so</i> poetic and it's <i>so</i> beautiful. I like Emma Pollock, one of your fellow Scottish people. I listen her latest a lot, it's called <i>The Law of Large Numbers</i>, and I'm sure she'll have another one on the way. I've been listening to the new Thurston Moore record, which is nice. We swapped records with Thurston. I like to listen to this guy Benjamion Schoos a lot. It sounds very Gainsbourg. We did a song together in fact. Oh, I'm doing my own promo here!<br /><br /><b>Go for it, do your own promo!</b><br />It's called 'Je Ne Vois Que Vous' and it's super fun! It's the perfect summer hit.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/zVDlGRBZrEg?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>Nice. What are your plans for the summer?</b><br />The album will be out, and we'll be touring with it. I know that in America I'm putting together a three-piece band, and then I'll be touring Europe either alone or with the three-piece band. I think the songs can stand the 'alone' thing. I could do it alone, or I could put together a three-piece for Europe, but it's all about the people. I want my guts to say, "Yes! This person!" Rather than just doing it because it has to be done this way.http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2012/07/laetitia-sadier.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9012396643092124758.post-2852676994517943083Tue, 22 May 2012 15:54:00 +00002012-05-24T00:35:24.237-07:00AltamontBig BusinessDale CroverElectrical Guitar CompanyFantomasMelvinsMelvins LiteNike SBPete EngelhartrototomShrinebuilderTomahawkDale Crover<b>Regarded by the wise as the finest band to ever come out of the American Northwest/Seattle area, the Melvins have spent the last (almost) thirty years releasing confounding, mesmeric, unconventional, smart and very often <i>thunderous</i> rock music. Equally as influenced by Black Flag as they are by Black Sabbath, and by Alice Coltrane as they are Alice Cooper; a Melvins record (or show) will do things to your mind that 'normal' music can not. Core duo of drummer Dale Crover and guitarist Buzz Osborne remain steadfastly two of the busiest men in music - seldom finding time between touring and recording with the Melvins and their various side-projects to even take part in interviews - so I was delighted when he agreed to talk to me. From playing drums on the first Nirvana demo, to touring the world with the Melvins and Mike Patton's Fantômas project (alongside his time with Shrinebuilder and as frontman of Altamont), he doesn't sit still for long.</b><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-nPyv0JIG4e4/T7uFyzoRP7I/AAAAAAAAANU/llnd9NVZ6yQ/s1600/Dale.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-nPyv0JIG4e4/T7uFyzoRP7I/AAAAAAAAANU/llnd9NVZ6yQ/s320/Dale.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Dale Crover. Photograph by Mackie Osbourne</span><b></b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></div><b>You're just about to go on tour, and you're finishing it off by playing at Mogwai's ATP. Are you going to see any of the other bands playing?</b><br />Unfortunately I don't think we're gonna get to see Mogwai, because I think they play the day after us, and we're playing another gig in France that day. But it should be pretty crazy playing with Slayer, y'know?! But we're just there for a day, so all we're gonna get to see is our show! I think us, Sleep and Slayer is all that's happening that day, but I could be wrong.<br /><b><br />Yeah, so you'll be in the same room as Dave Lombardo - can we expect anything special from the two of you?</b><br />Not yet. But you never know! We'll see!<br /><br /><b>You <a href="http://www.scionav.com/collection/917" target="_blank">gave your last EP away for free.</a> Is this something you'll be doing with future releases?</b> <b>I know you've been experimenting with packaging...</b><br />Well, unfortunately it ends up for free anyway! Haha! Pretty much every release we've done in the last ten years has ended up online before it's actually out. So one thing that's sort of cool about this, is that <i>(label)</i> Scion is actually giving it away free. And, also, they've paid us for that! I think it's kind of a unique situation. I don't know how much this will happen. With people being able to download illegally, it's probably going to make it so that we won't make full-length records any more. But we will be doing things like you mentioned, like special packaging. Usually it's vinyl, but we've done a couple of special-package CDs, and they're all limited edition. The way we see it, music is now free, so you're basically paying for a nice package. Nice artwork.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/R6ggvDpEvvc?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>And you're gonna give us that?</b><br />Oh yeah. There's a bunch of different twelve inches coming out from the live record that we put out last year. Thirteen twelve inches, because there's thirteen songs on the record, and the flipside is a split with another band.<br /><b><br />How did these splits come about? You're doing stuff with some pretty cool bands.</b><br />Yeah! Haha! We just thought "Who would be cool to do this with?", and then we thought "The bands don't even need to exist any more!", so we just thought we could use some old bands that we like, and songs that they've released already. Bands like the The Necros, Die Kreuzen, you can't really find their stuff anywhere. We figured that if they could give us an old song it'd be something kinda cool. I'm sure a lot of people haven't heard some of that stuff either.<br /><br /><b>It looks to me that everybody you asked must have said yes.</b><br />Pretty much, yeah! I don't think anybody said no. Haha! Which is great! Like The Necros, who don't exist any more, were like "I don't think we can do anything", and we were like "You don't have to <i>do</i> anything!" So there hasn't been much of a problem.<br /><b><br />How did Melvins Lite come about? Is it something that's going to come and go?</b><br />I think so. We've played with <i>(bassist)</i> Trevor <i>(Dunn)</i> in the past. Before the Big Business guys were in our band he did some touring with us, and also did the Houdini live record with us. Once we got the Big Business guys in our band we said "We don't want you guys to quit your band, but while you're doing your thing we might do something else, possibly with Trevor and possibly with someone else". The Big Business guys did a big tour last summer, and we decided that - since they were gone - we would see if Trevor wanted to play some shows with us. Buzz had seen him play stand-up bass, doing a more kind of jazz thing, and he thought it was really cool. Really different. We thought that if we played with him for this, it'd make it really different from what we were doing with the Big Band. We booked four shows, and worked out a set. It was a set of old songs, and we thought it worked out really good, so we decided to do a whole record like that, and tour it and stuff. We'll be doing that later in the year. We're about to hit the road with the Big Business guys and Unsane, and then the Melvins Lite record will be out. I think in June some time.<b><br />&nbsp;</b>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/hOIiLt0ZoRk?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div class="gmail_quote"></div><div class="gmail_quote"><br /><b>Is there going to be another one after this one? </b></div><div class="gmail_quote">Yeah, well, we recorded a whole bunch of stuff. We've got enough stuff for at least another EP, probably. Maybe more. We'll see what happens. Eventually we'd like to do a tour where it's Melvins Lite, and Melvins including the Big Business guys. We'd eventually like to do something where Trevor's playing with us as well. Two bass players. We've been playing with the first Melvins drummer <i>(Mike Dillard)</i> too, calling that Melvins 1983. We've recorded a twelve inch EP for that too.<b>&nbsp;</b></div><div class="gmail_quote"></div><div class="gmail_quote"><b>And you're working with <i>(former bassist)</i> Kevin <i>(Rutmanis)</i> again. What's that like?</b></div><div class="gmail_quote">We ended up doing a Roxy Music song with Kevin and Jello Biafra. We've kinda become friends with Kevin again. We knew that he had done this Roxy Music song before, with Tomahawk.<br /><br /><b>And what song is it?</b><br />Ahhhhhh... It's sort of a secret. Next year will actually be the thirtieth anniversary of the band, so hopefully we can do some sort of tour and have all three versions of the band play.<br /><br /><b>There are rumours of a new Fantômas album. Can you tell me anything about that?</b><br />Well, I don't know anything about it, and Buzz doesn't know anything about it at all. So if there <i>is</i> one, he's not including us. Haha! I read that some place too, like "Oh, there's a new Fantômas!", but I don't think so. It could be true, but I don't think so.<br /><br /></div><div class="gmail_quote"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-SlINx0Vcljw/T7uW782CSII/AAAAAAAAAN0/iGl1RZ3no9o/s1600/Melvins3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-SlINx0Vcljw/T7uW782CSII/AAAAAAAAAN0/iGl1RZ3no9o/s320/Melvins3.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="gmail_quote" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Melvins 2012. L-R Jared Warren, Coady Willis, Dale Crover, Buzz Osbourne. Photograph by Mackie Osbourne. </span><b><br /> </b></div><br /><b>What about a new Altamont record then?</b><br />Yeah, I hope so. We've been recording some songs - slowly but surely we're getting stuff finished - but I've been so busy doing Melvins stuff that I just haven't really had time, y'know? Plus the other guys live in San Fransisco, so it's a little hard for us to get together and practice.<br /><br /><b>Where are you?</b><br />I live in Los Angeles.</div><div class="gmail_quote"><br /><b>Is anything going to happen with the stuff you recorded with Jason Newsted and Devin Townsend?</b> <br />I have no idea. I haven't talked to either of those guys since we recorded that stuff. That was like... Oh gosh. I can't even remember when. That was like 1997 or so? It was when he was still in Metallica. The reason that that thing came about to begin with, was that Kyuss had split up - and Kyuss had done some touring with Metallica - and Jason had heard about it and called Scott Reader to find out what the story was, and Scott was really bummed out. He was like "Why don't you come down and we can record and have fun, and you can forget about this stuff?" That's when they thought of calling me, and having me come over to play drums. It was just this weird weekend recording/jam session kind of thing, and that was pretty much the last time I talked to either Jason or Devin. He should put it out. I don't know what he does. He's kind of disappeared off the map, musically. I'm sure he's financially set. He probably made a lot of money off the Black Album, y'know? I mean, that was huge! I guess he doesn't <i>have</i> to work... When I went over there and played, it seemed he was really into recording, and doing different projects, and playing a lot. I mean, he'd done a bunch of different projects with other people as well. He had his own recording studio at his house. It was really cool. I know he was in Voivod for a while, right? But now, I haven't heard anything.</div><div class="gmail_quote"><br /><b>Electrical Guitar Company were meant to be building you a drum kit. What became of that?</b><br />I think it's still happening. I talked to the guy not too long ago, and I think he's gonna have something for me pretty soon. He's just been so busy with building guitars that I think it's been put on the back burner a little bit. Actually, he built a bass for the new bass player from Metallica. And the guys from Cheap Trick are buying a bunch of stuff from him.<br /><b><br />It seems appropriate that Cheap Trick would want his guitars now.</b><br />Yeah! He's having a bit of success.<br /><b><br />What was that rototom thing you used to play?</b><br />Haha! That's exactly what it was. It was the bottom of a rototom. It kinda had a bell sound. I dunno, I think Terry Bozzio came up with that idea.<br /><br /><b>Is Bozzio your favourite Zappa drummer?</b><br />Probably. Actually, I like Captain Beefheart better. I like Drumbo. He was great.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vN2dn8ruAls/T7uvY98vvoI/AAAAAAAAAOA/-3P_qAbVGPk/s1600/Dale2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vN2dn8ruAls/T7uvY98vvoI/AAAAAAAAAOA/-3P_qAbVGPk/s320/Dale2.jpg" width="220" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Dale. Photograph by KRK Dominguez.</span></div><br /><b>How were you introduced to ribbon crashers, and to Pete Engelhart's metallic instruments?</b><br />I found that stuff in San Fransisco a long time ago, and became a fan of it right away. I thought it was a really cool percussion piece. Very sharp and abrasive sounding. We were really into that band Pussy Galore, and he <i>(Bob Bert)</i> used to hit on a gas tank and stuff like that, and had all this metal stuff. We thought it was a kind of cool piece to add in with our sound. Now I use a bunch of his stuff. I really like his stuff a lot. He's great. I'm kind of surprised more people didn't catch on to his stuff. I think the people who use it are more kind of Latin percussionists. It's good for me, because it makes my sound more unique!<br /><b><br />Where did you learn to do that 'gravity blast', the one-handed roll on your snare?</b><br />Haha! I just figured it out. I'd read this interview with Ian Paice - do you know who he is? He plays drums for Deep Purple - and he does this one-handed roll, and they were asking him about it, and he was like "I'm not gonna tell you!" Haha! So I just kinda figured it out on my own. Later, I looked up on the internet and discovered that there's a bunch of YouTube videos of people doing it.<br /><br /><b>And you can do it with both hands?</b><br />Yup.<br /><b><br />You play brushes on one of the tracks on Freak Puke. Is that the first time you've done that on a record?</b><br />Yeah. Actually it is.<br /><b><br />I guess it sits well with the stand-up bass, and with it all being mellower.<br /> </b>Yeah, it just kind of fit the song.<b> </b>Y'know, maybe, actually, that might be wrong...<b> </b>That's the first time I've played with <i>wire</i> brushes, but I've recorded stuff in the past where I've used these plastic brushes a bunch. But traditional brushes, yeah - that's the first time.<br /><br /><b>How's your hearing?</b> <b>Do you have any hearing problems?</b><br />Oh yeah, it's goin'! It's just gonna get worse and worse. Oh well.<br /><br /><b>Bill Bruford or Neil Peart?</b><br />Hmmmm... Ahhh... Jeez, I don't know... I'm probably more interested in Neil Peart.<br /><b><br />Bill Stevenson or Robo?</b><br />That's a tough one. But Bill Stevenson. Yeah.<br /><br /><b>John Bonham or Bill Ward?</b><br />Apples and oranges. I'd say Keith Moon.<br /><br /><b>Elvin Jones or Tony Williams?</b><br />Ooh, that's a tough one. Umm... I definitely listen to a lot of the Tony Williams stuff from when he was playing with Miles Davis. But they're both pretty good. I'll tell you who the best drummer is I've ever seen. And he'll be the king.<br /><br /><b>Go on.</b><br />Buddy Rich. He's the best drummer I've ever seen, for sure. He's from another planet. Most drummers I can watch, and figure out what they're doing, but when you watch him, you see stuff and you're just "Oh my God", y'know? Keith Moon's a little bit like that too. There's some drum solos of his that are a little bit crazy. I like more the kind of radical drummers like that, y'know? A lot of people don't like Keith Moon, and think he's too sloppy, but I don't know what the heck they're talking about. He might have been drunk a few times, playing drums, but he's a great drummer. Also Ian Paice, I did see him a few times, and I was completely blown away by his playing. He's one of the best ones out there.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/zR8l0koXCcM?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><b><br />What's your favourite horror movie?</b><br />Hmm. Probably Evil Dead. Either Evil Dead or The Exorcist. I like a lot of the <i>real</i> vampire movies, from the Hammer era. Christopher Lee movies.<br /><br /><b>What would you be doing if you hadn't pursued music?</b><br />I dunno. I'd wanted to play music since I was about eleven. With it being that long, I'd have probably wanted to be a fireman or a cowboy. Or a baseball player. Haha!<br /><br /><b>How did the shoe come about? Nike SB made a Melvins Dunk.</b><br />We had a friend that worked there. I can't remember what he did there, but he was in the skateboard division of Nike. They asked a bunch of bands about doing shoes. We got Buzz's wife Mackie to do the design. There's two different ones. It's weird, there's this whole shoe-world that we didn't know existed. There are people who are big <i>shoe collectors</i>. Buzz was in a shoe store where they had the Melvins shoe, and this guy, this total hip-hop guy, came in and was like "No way, there's the Melvins shoe! That one's the shit!" And Buzz is looking at him and thinking that there's no way he knows anything about our band. He just knows the shoe. We've ran across a few people like that, who had no idea who the band was but were really into the shoe. We were selling some of them on eBay, and people always wanted to know that it wasn't a bootleg, and we were like, "There's not going to be any bootleg Melvins shoes, what are they talking about?" but then I saw one, somebody showed me one, and I was like "Oh my God, there really is!" There's actually bootleg versions of that shoe out there.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HIXlEGz8zGE/T7u10pyUCtI/AAAAAAAAAOU/upUMsjXWcIw/s1600/melvinsdunk.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HIXlEGz8zGE/T7u10pyUCtI/AAAAAAAAAOU/upUMsjXWcIw/s320/melvinsdunk.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">The Nike SB Melvins shoe.</span></div><br /><b>People download your music for free, and now they bootleg your shoe...</b><br />Haha! I mean, since they're 'collectible', they go for a lot of money, so I could see why people would do that, y'know? I could tell the rip-off because the label was different, and some of the material, wasn't the same. But that was a real surprise. I couldn't believe it.<br /><br /><b>I think it's great that you did it. Dinosaur Jr. have one too. Whether people are interested in music or shoes, it's cool that people are into <i>something</i>. Was it a hard decision?</b><br /><div style="text-align: left;">It was a no-brainer! "We want to do a Melvins shoe." "OK!" "We'll pay you guys in shoes." "OK! Sounds good!" We had no problems with it at all.<span style="font-size: x-small;">&nbsp;</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"></div><b>What other Melvins albums would you like to perform live?</b><br />Well, actually, we're going to do the whole EP on this tour. So, the new one! But as far as a special performance, I don't know, but I think we're gonna make it over to Europe and do that whole residency thing that we did here. Eventually.<br /><b><br />Do you have any plans to play either Hospital Up, Inhumanity and Death, P.G.x3 or I'll Finish You Off live?</b><br />Umm... I'd like to do Hospital Up, at least. That'd be good, but it might be kinda hard.<br /><br /><b>Do you have any pets?</b><br /><b>&nbsp;</b>I do. I have a dog.<br /><br /><b>A loyal, noble dog? Or a wild, ferocious beast?</b><br />He's a very well-behaved dog. He's very mild-mannered. His name's Arthur.<br /><b><br />Have you ever posted on <a href="http://themelvins.net/">themelvins.net</a>?</b><br />Have <i>I</i> ever posted there? Nah. I wouldn't post there.<br /><b><br />Have you ever had a scary encounter with a crazy fan?</b><br />Well, there's certainly people who are very enthusiastic, and that you see at a lot of shows, but nobody's <i>stalked</i> us or anything. Which is good. There's crazy people out there for sure, there's fans of ours who are nuts, but that's OK.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-my5fApQieUk/T7uz7C-ZPSI/AAAAAAAAAOM/_KmLO4Dj9Oc/s1600/melvins.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-my5fApQieUk/T7uz7C-ZPSI/AAAAAAAAAOM/_KmLO4Dj9Oc/s320/melvins.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Melvins 2010.</span></div><br /><b>What's your favourite Nirvana song?</b><br />Favourite Nirvana song? Hmm... Smells Like Teen Spirit! Haha! No, actually I think my favourite one is In Bloom.<br /><b><br />Did you hear that 'mash up' of <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEbtE0HxDrA" target="_blank">Revolver and the Beyonce song Single Ladies</a>?</b><br />No! Is that on YouTube? I'll need to check it out.<br /><br /><b>It's not bad, it sounds kinda 'right'.</b><br />Who did it?<br /><b><br />Just some guy in his bedroom I think. Nobody famous or anything.</b> <b>How did you get hooked up with Volcom?</b><br />Through Totimoshi. Those guys had a record on there, and they asked us to do a split. We figured it'd be cool. I guess I don't really know too many of the guys there, but I worked on the record by that band Tweak Bird, and Volcom put that out. They gave us suits a couple of years ago. Haha! For those times that I have to wear a suit. I still have a bunch of their socks too, Volcom's good for clothes.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/5mSYtizAhcE?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><br /><b>It's cool that you get shoes and suits just for playing music. Apart from Tweak Bird, is there anybody you think people should be listening to?</b><br />I don't know... I've been doing a bunch of recording. The engineer that works for the Melvins and myself have been trying to work with other bands, doing either performance or production. Or both. I've worked with a bunch of bands that I've done drum parts for, or percussion overdubs, and one of those bands is a band from Canada called Indian Handcrafts. They're pretty good.<br /><b><br />Is there anybody you'd like to work with?</b><br />Not particularly. I would work with pretty much anyone who was serious about doing something. Even if it was something completely not what I'm used to. I don't mind. It makes it more interesting. I always thought that hip-hop should have real drums. That would be something interesting.<br /><b><br />The Roots do it quite well, but it's still just hip-hop drums. It'd be good to hear something a bit more out-there.</b><br />Yeah. The normal hip-hop stuff just now, it's not very exciting. I just think it could be way better. I used to listen to N.W.A. a lot, but they seem like a punk rock band, y'know?<br /><br /></div><div class="gmail_quote"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowFullScreen='true' webkitallowfullscreen='true' mozallowfullscreen='true' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/khxJ1pxoSm0?feature=player_embedded' FRAMEBORDER='0' /></div><div class="gmail_quote"></div><div class="gmail_quote"></div><div class="gmail_quote"><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">Massive thanks to Kevin Parrott and Kurt Midness for helping me arrange this, and the good people of <a href="http://www.themelvins.net/forum/index.php" target="_blank">themelvins.net forum</a> for the best questions. </span></div><br />http://bitemywire.blogspot.com/2012/05/dale-crover.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Neil Macdonald)1